


Without a Cause

by msdaphne



Series: Without A Cause [1]
Category: Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens (2015)
Genre: Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, And He Knows It, D/s, F/M, Finally Finn, Force Evangelism, Gen, Headspace, Infantilizing pheremones, Ivan Karamazov Explains Subspace, Journey Through the Underworld, M/M, Murder, Poe Dameron hurts so pretty, Prostitution, Seduction to the Dark Side, Takotsubo syndrome, Tragedy, hazing/rape in the military, narcotic deathwish fantasy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-11
Updated: 2017-01-16
Packaged: 2018-09-01 10:01:23
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death, Rape/Non-Con, Underage
Chapters: 15
Words: 39,306
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8620081
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/msdaphne/pseuds/msdaphne
Summary: “Tell me more about the ex-pilot. Tell me who you are without your Resistance to fight for.”Poe has something Kylo wants, and Kylo has something to offer in return, whether Poe wants it or not.(The Underage warning is for self-exploration and consensual sex between teenagers.)





	1. Prologue: The Upward Spiral

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Poe receives the wisdom of his elders. He's pretty sure he knows the difference between being masochistic and self-destructive.

* * *

 

This was literally his worst nightmare.

The two finest heads of hair in the galaxy. Well, human, male heads. Together. Without anyone apparently buying drinks for them. Yet.

And here he was, just two weeks out from his _last ever_ cadet buzzcut.

They were grayer than in the comics and holos and the one still photo his dad kept on a shelf. But they were unmistakable. The pirate, shaggy and grouchy and eminently tousle-able. The privateer, enviably put-together, mildly amused by everything around him, including his companion.

He wasn't about to spot them across the room and _not_ go buy them drinks, before the rest of the graduates spotted and flocked to them. But for fuck's sake, why not a couple of months from now when his hair had grown out a little?

Ok, maybe not _worst_ nightmare, but. _A_ nightmare.

"Pardon me, Sirs.”

They turned, Han squinting and Lando smiling widely.

“Well congratulations, Lieutenant.”

“You can tell, Sir.”

Han waved his hand around in the _all this_ motion, with particular attention paid to the crewcut.

“Why d'ya think we're here, kid?"

_Really? They came to see us graduate?_

"Semi-retired old guy like me can't be expected to pay for his own drinks _all_ the time."

_Right, then._

“Will you allow me the honor of contributing to the cause?”

The bartender smiled. Lando nodded toward Poe, and then at their glasses.

"What's your name, kid?”

“Second Lieutenant Poe Dameron, at your service, Sirs.”

"No shit," Han's voice was soft, almost a whisper.

Lando's eyes openly raked across his face and body. Much as Poe would have liked to think the old scoundrel was checking him out, he knew better. For one thing, he was used to watching veterans of the Civil War scrutinize him for resemblance to his folks. For another, rumor had it guys had been striking out since long before Poe was even born.

He dropped a lazy eyelid anyway, almost a reflex, and earned himself a flash of the blinding grin he recognized from history volumes, and an equally recognizable sort of helpless wince from Han.

"Oh-ho, stars, would ya look at that."

"Fuck, he's a _baby_."

"Shouldn't be surprised, tho."

"Those two couldn't keep their hands off each other to save their lives."

"Well, literally to save their lives."

"And _other_ people's lives."

"Yours, a couple times, if I recall."

"You know what I mean."

The rhythmic banter between two old heroes would have been intoxicating enough on any subject, but they were talking about his _parents_. He forced his mouth to move.

"They were very much in love. As I understand it. I was, pretty young."

"Mmm. Yeah you were."

"Sorry. Sorry I didn't make it to the - y'know," Han wasn't sure where to go from there. “Well, tell your old man hi for me. From one outclassed sonofabitch to another." He clinked Poe's glass and drank.

"She was a goddamned hero," Lando agreed.

"My first," Poe said, feeling oddly like she was more _theirs_ than his. "Still my #1 hero. Sorry," he added, nodding at Han.

"Psh," Han rolled his eyes.

“I just mean, you're #1 to a lot of people, Sir.”

“You clearly haven't met his wife."

"And your dad's no fucking slouch.”

“I met her a few times. When I was a kid. And I meant - pilot heroes. Of course.”

“Nn-hm. Well, kid, you know what they say about heroes.”

“Heh," Lando answered for him. "They say a hero's just a masochist with something worth fighting for.”

He knew how he meant it, as a gentle tease to his poorer and more heavily scarred old friend. But. Poe had _not_ heard that maxim before, and damn if it didn't hit all his buttons. His next breath flowed into bottomless lungs, he flushed with pride, feeling suddenly two inches taller. There was no way he was keeping a straight face, but he tried to fight off the sheer _smugness_ that wanted to erupt there.

“You tell all the young pilots that?”

Lando raised an eyebrow at him. “Most of them take it as a warning.”

Han looked hard at Poe. “He's not talking about whatever, _recreational activities_ you kids get up to nowadays. Listen, kid, I've seen a lot of self-destructive pilots. Soldiers, too, anyone who fights for a living. And, for what it's worth, there's still plenty of Darksiders out there. I don't want to hear about my friends' kid going on any suicide missions.”

“No, Sir. No suicide missions. I promise. Unless it's really, _really_ important.” Charming smile. And just then some of his friends rolled up, equally giddy with admiration, interrupting just in time to stop him - no, save him - from asking Han Solo and Lando Calrissian what they knew about _recreational activities. Sirs._

They were happy to regale the group with war stories as long as the drinks were coming, and they had plenty of advice for the baby pilots. Some of it sounded like bullshit, some of it was pretty common sense. He definitely noticed the way Lando's eyes swept over his old friend as he offered this gem:

_"Look, I'm not gonna tell you to be safe out there, we all know what that's worth. But I am gonna tell you something they didn't tell ya at the academy. You find yourself stranded, maybe even captured? Remember one thing: there's nothing in this galaxy sexier than an injured pilot. Whatever your persuasion, you find the right person, you can have them eating out of the palm of your hand.”_

  

* * *

 

 

He'd been honest, then, about not looking for suicide missions. He isn't self-destructive. Not _really_.

Okay, there's a _little_ part of him. Something beckoning downward. Something that wants to drag him down, not just under the surface but right down the fucking drain.

It promises a messy, inglorious fate. He mostly ignores it, or doesn't take it very seriously; there will be plenty of time to confront it down the line, when fate catches up with him. Because right now? The part that lifts him up is so much stronger.

The part that is drawn to disappearing into something other, something greater than himself.

It had made him a leader in the academy. He wasn't as concerned with his grades, his rank or his evaluations; so much as with his class, his squadron, his comrades. Whenever he rotated into a student cadre position, he inhabited it, his own ego disappearing into the role.

It's true, too, of the ships he flies. Plenty of pilots claim that when they're “in the zone,” the ship feels like an extension of their body. He feels, rather, that he is a component of the ship. A vital one, sure, on par with the astromech, but a component nonetheless. After all, a sentient with all the destructive power of a starfighter in their hands can still be prone to caprice or even malice. But an x-wing fighter is a part of a fleet, deployed to protect the galaxy from fascist imperialism.

And that mission is what is worth fighting for.

That mission is why he joined the only faction in the galaxy that sees the First Order for the threat they are. When he did, he gave his body, his heart and his soul to it, immersed in the need to be worthy of the command he's been given, and to inspire the same loyalty in his squadrons.

...

And yeah, it sounds simplistic, but one could compare it to sex. The need to put his faith in someone else - a partner, or his comrades. The thrill of making the choice to trust, and the comfort of accepting that choice.

The fear, going into battle. The cold white hot crack of a leather strap softening to red and finally, blissfully, to black. Gratitude for soft kisses and kind words. The ground beneath his feet again.

And increasingly, lately, the breathless pink uncertainty of a scalpel on his flesh. It's not technically sex, but it is sex; it just  _is_. Just like all this covert spy shit doesn't look like fighting, but it _is_. Rarefied, maybe, but still fighting.

...

They don't always win. Sometimes, they seem to be losing. Sometimes, his brain rebels against the terrible odds, and his body doesn't want to move toward the danger.

So sometimes, when he needs to, when he needs the extra shot of courage, he does something just a little bit perverse. He gives himself not just to the Resistance, but to Leia herself, its living avatar. Feels himself as an instrument of her will, her hands guiding him into battle like a servomech.

Not that she could ever find out about that, gods no. He knew how it would go:

The lecture he'd get about _recapitulating oppression_ and about _free will_ and _self-determination._ He would try to explain that this _is_ his free will; that his temporary and willing submission in battle is no more fascist than his adult, consenting sex life is abusive.

He knows the difference between loyalty and obedience. He's hardly obedient by nature; who knows that better than she? It's just a crutch, extra courage, something to get him through a mission, the same way other soldiers use stim tabs.

He'd stand as tall and defiant as he could, rest the back of his calm, steady hand against her own, look her dead in the eye, and ask, _Would you rather I had a stim habit, Ma'am?_

As if sarcasm could prove his point about obedience.

She couldn't tell him what or how to think. But she would withdraw, pull away from him, because she would never again be certain that he could stand up to her when she needed him to. If his fate came in the form of a photon missile, she'd get over it alright. Missiles: quick, painless, kinda what he signed up for.

 

But this: alone in the bowels of a star destroyer, facing interrogation, torture, and an unmarked death.

He prayed to everything good and light in the universe that Bee would make it back to her. But when ey did, ey'd tell her what had happened, how he'd been taken, probably beg her to try to rescue him. It was going to hurt her enough as it was, without her having to resent him for it, too.

 _This_ is why he'd never spoken of it to a living soul.

 

 


	2. Happy Places

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The full irony of the term "happy place" was somewhat lost on his generation. To them, it was just a callous nickname for the unique and usually very private mechanisms they developed to cope with duress and, ultimately, resist interrogation. Poe had a half-dozen or so. The direst one wasn't actually a place, and it sure as fuck wasn't happy.

* * *

 

So maybe it hadn't been the best idea to try to sass his way through a random FO stop-and-pummel. Who did he think he was, Han Solo? (And, honestly, how often had it really even worked for Han?) Especially when he realized it wasn't a random raid; they were after the same objective; they were after _him_.

He was - detained? Arrested? Abducted? Nothing technically legal, but that had never stopped them before. While the factional lines were rapidly hardening across the galaxy, war had yet to be formally declared. But everyone knew what was up. For all practical purposes, he was a prisoner of war, now. So, he guessed, he'd better start acting like one.

That, at least, was something he knew about. He'd trained to protect himself, to protect the mission, to protect his comrades. Whether that training could ever be adequate was doubtful, but it was something to cling to, and that in itself was a comfort.

Supposedly, giving his name, rank and homeworld would give him a better chance of ever getting out alive. But those were the old rules, from the last war. It was unlikely he'd live to ever see the light of the stars again; it didn't seem worth it to give even that much information, because anything could be used to manipulate him.

No one would ever order him to give up that thin hope - it would be illegal as well as immoral - but they didn't need to. He took a deep breath. He pulled his manacled hands up to his chest, bowed his head and kissed his own knuckles, wet and tender and sad. He closed his eyes and sank straight to his happy place of last resort.

The full irony of the term _happy place_ was somewhat lost on his generation. To them, it was just a callous nickname for IVARS, the unique and usually very private mechanisms they developed to cope with duress and, ultimately, resist interrogation. _Individualized visualization resilience strategy,_ something like that. Poe had a half-dozen or so. The direst one wasn't actually a place, and it sure as fuck wasn't happy.

_He remembered the choice to have the surgery. He remembered signing the papers. He remembered the last time he sang for his friends. He remembered the anesthesiologist patiently waiting for him to stop sobbing. He remembered enduring months of irritating throat aches afterward, before he really learned to not even try._

_He remembered when he could still tap out some consonants with his tongue, and mutilating that too, enough to make those consonants indistinct, leaving just enough to eat and swallow. He remembered the last, determined measure, injecting todocaine into his lips before he slashed them open and sewed them together, leaving just enough open at the corners to suck nutrients through a straw. He remembered unreturned kisses across the gruesome scar._

 

It was brutal, but it worked. In training, anyway.

 

* * *

 

 

The ground troopers that had brought him in had been rough enough; the four guards waiting in the cell, one with with a stun baton, were enough to make him cower against the wall, manacles clutched to his chest. But the brig guards seemed perfunctory, if not downright disinterested. The sergeant sat down with his data pad while the other three batted the prisoner around casually and asked vague questions.

The sergeant murmured to himself as he pecked at the screen, giving the date and the ship's time and his name - "Sergeant" and then what sounded like a string of numbers. He narrated some version of events:

“The.. pris..ner.. claimed.. igno.. rance.. of the ob..jec.tive."

 _Bullshit, I haven't said a godsdamned thing._ _Since we left the surface, anyway. Idiot._

"..that.. the.. Firrst .. Or.der.. can.. quote.. go.. to.. hell.. unnn.quote. Eff.Dee..Four.One..Four.Four.. ap.plied.. com..pliance.. proto.. col.. thirty.. six-A." He turned to look at them.

"Shit or get off the vac, boys. I think he's a big one."

...

 _That's right_ , thought Kylo, from the other side of the wall. _Put your toys down and kick him in the face already_. After all, the bastard was even more beautiful now than he had been as a child. And after the way he'd sassed him, Kylo wasn't about to face him again until his nose was broken at the very least. A few missing teeth would be ideal.

He was impatient to get the map, of course, but now he also had the pleasure of probing Poe at his leisure to look forward to. Poe was having some very interesting thoughts already, much darker than he'd seen before in her people. He was eager to know if this was something new in their training and culture, or if maybe, just maybe, the sweet, kind, child of the light he remembered had stepped toward the dark at some point.

Impatient and eager, but to his frustration it was _policy_ that this phase was essential to morale. He didn't understand how it could be good for their morale to fail over and over, but they weren't his troops.

...

They had Poe back on his feet, his shirt open. 1881's back was against the wall, and he held Poe at arm's length, one hand holding him by the neck, the other fisted around his belt.

"Keep your hands down."

Poe was glaring into the holocorder, putting on his best _dont give them a Force-damned thing for me_ face for the proof-of-life holo he assumed they were making. He also assumed they were pulling his shirt aside to expose his identifying scars, since he sure as hell wasn't about to give them a voiceprint.

4144 poked at him with the stun baton. His muscles spasmed involuntarily, but it was hardly what he'd call torture. Yet. Poe's unconventional resistance strategy went unchallenged, as they hadn't even asked him to state his name yet. This was _nothing_ like SERE, and he briefly wished he could survive to debrief on their methods. Also the stun baton. The model they'd trained with had mutiple taze settings, but this one seemed to shock proportionally to the impact of the blows.

He shook his head. Even thinking about training was too close to acknowledging things he shouldn't even be thinking about: The war and his part in it. The very existence of the Resistance. He focused again on a familiar, reassuring exercise: narrowing his existence down to here and now.

 

The room he was in was all he knew. Nowhere else existed. He was born here. He lived here. He would die here. Until then, he would drink in its spare details with the zeal of a naturalist. He set about estimating its dimensions, imagining a little rule and flipping it along the vertices.

He was halfway up the door frame when a whack to the small of his back took his knees out from under him. The trooper behind him pulled him back to his feet. Another between his shoulder blades brought his elbows back like birds wings, jerking so quickly that his wrists caught painfully in the heavy manacles.

4144 waited for his prisoner to regain both his footing and his breath. He rubbed the baton around the middle of his back, under the shoulder blades. He picked his spot and tapped.

Poe arched backward, head snapping back in 1881's grip, mouth flying open. A faint _Ah!_ escaped with his gasp.

" _That's_ it," encouraged the trooper with the recorder.

 

Even through the vocoder, Poe recognized that tone of voice. Relishing and demanding, the voice of someone who had found the keys to him. Under the right circumstances, he _liked_ that voice. The voice itself was a key; he felt it click, felt a treasonous little urge to please the speaker.

It was like someone exhaling spice in your face and pressing the pipe into your hand. Wrong person, wrong place, wrong everything, but you'd still feel some _little_ bit of want. It was easy enough to crush the urge, under the circumstances, but the fact that he'd felt anything at all was scary.

_What the fuck was that?_

He stared at the tiny ghost of himself in the recorder's proof as 4144 rubbed the baton around again, buzzing lightly, almost tickling, making him twitch, and tapped again. Again he arched and gasped.

 

It would actually be a pretty effective POL, if you showed it to the right people. The thought was amusing for a moment, and then suddenly it wasn't anymore. It wasn't funny, it was fucking awful. That's exactly what they were doing, weren't they? They were making some kind of... porn.

He felt himself staring wide-eyed and appalled at the trooper holding the recorder.

"That's _good,_ look at me."

He looked straight at the recorder and raised the manacles in front of his face with both middle fingers extended. And immediately felt his guts ripped out of his body with red-hot tongs. Next thing he knew he was on the floor, winded, tears in his eyes, bile threatening his throat. He scrambled up to his knees and breathed deep; the last thing he needed now was to puke.

"I told you to keep your hands down."

They hauled him to his feet, still panting. The trooper gripped his wrists, touched a button on the manacles and clicked them together again behind his back.

_Nice going._

This wasn't how this was supposed to go. He was supposed to be brave, and stoic, and go to his execution with his mouth shut. And someday, when they _won_ , some archivist would go through the records of this ship, and write a paragraph about him to go in the Lives of the martyrs, and at least _one_ person would know he'd done his part and died a hero.

He wasn't supposed to be remembered for  _this_. 

He could see himself in the proof, barechested and writhing. He wasn't flattering himself by acknowledging that pain looked good on him. It was just a fact, one that he'd enjoyed all his adult life, and now he felt like he was paying with his soul for every ounce of pleasure he'd ever gotten from it.

All the horror that had been circling around inside his head found its center of gravity: whoever the intended audience was, they were going to enjoy it. They were going to _jerk off_ to it. Would it stay here, something to entertain the troops? Or would they release it, to damage Resistance morale? He imagined millions of people across the galaxy, enemies gloating, friendlies admiring, all of them masturbating to _the last, anguished moments of his life._

 

He couldn't even fall back on  _it's just pain, it'll all be over soon_. This was something he had to fix. He pulled out the only weapon he had; he twisted his face into the ugliest mask of disgust he could muster.

"Don't do that."

4144 swung the baton hard into his balls again. 1881 allowed him to crumple forward, curled in and sucking for air. When they got him to his feet again, he sneered again at the recorder, and got the same treatment. This time, 4144 yanked back on his hair, so he was staring at the ceiling.

"How's that?" he asked 3070, behind the corder.

"That's good. '81, hold him like that." The silent trooper behind him did as instructed.

"Settle down, scum. No-one's gonna hurt you." The irony of this coming from a man who'd just clubbed and tazed him thrice in the balls was lost on Poe, as he knew that the _hurt_ he was talking about was something categorically different.

They had him good; he was out of bolts. His pulse was as wild as his thoughts. That had to stop. He blinked at the ceiling, breathing, breathing, breathing. He took out his imaginary rule again and flipped it around the vertices: _20.. 40.. 60.. 80.. one. 20.. 40..._

 

 _Millions of people_ was probably an outside guess. And who was he to most of them anyway? No one he loved would ever watch it. Well, someone from comms, and someone from intel, to look for hidden messages. But they'd hate every second of it. He believed in them.

_...80.. three. 20.. 40.. 60..._

Hell, for all he knew they weren't even recording, the whole thing a tactic to get into his head. At some point they took his shirt entirely; if they commented on his scars he didn't hear it.

...

When the door hissed open and another trooper entered, the guards' irritation was evident even through the vocoders.

"Not til Beta, Alf. Like, the end of it. Lotta bullshit to edit out here."

Alf laid a chip on the sergeant's desk and approached 4144.

"Get outta here, man. We're almost done here. We don't have time for this."

Alf looked at Poe and back at 4144.

"Doesn't look like you even started."

"Look, he's someone important. Ren's gonna be down here any minute."

"Fuck Kylo Ren."

Three helmets whipped toward 3070 and the holocorder.

"It's paused, it's paused!" he cried, hands up.

Alf held up three more chips. "Well fucking unpause it and get busy. The boys want some fucking action, not a fucking portrait."

"Well they don't have to _fucking_ watch it then."

"Fo," Alf punched 4144 in the chest. "Your boy Twist. Wants the chance to give it to someone else for a change."

1881 was indeed pulling Poe closer to him, but not like he wanted to _give him_ anything. More like a human shield. Poe instinctively crowded back against him.

...

Someone was screaming, silently, and it wasn't the pilot. Kylo's view of the scene through the wall was interrupted by 1881's amygdala exploding, blazing white and cold and blinding. It took him a moment to shield himself from the man's terror.

...

"We don't have time for this."

Alf snapped the chips together into a stack and pressed them into Fo's palm.

"I have time."

Fo hesitated. He looked at the sergeant, who was aggressively ignoring them, hunched so far over his pad his helmet nearly touched the desk. He looked at 3070, who shrugged. He did not look at Poe or 1881. He let Alf close his fingers around the chips.

"Eighty-one. How bout you, uh, stand guard in the hall." 1881 was still frozen, unwilling to step out from behind the prisoner.

...

Whatever had happened to 1881 - or, had _been_ happening - he was a hell of a lot more afraid of the newcomer, 1151, than was the pilot. Poe was afraid, but he was also reeking of disdain. Kylo shared that disdain; the Order had just proved itself twice over in a matter of seconds to be morally fathomless.

...

1881 finally released Poe and stepped toward the door, but the two others blocked his way. He took the moment to spare a glance at the prisoner. The prisoner's eyes were wide and looking intently at him.

_Is that really what they call you? Fucking hell, man. You heard him, right? Your boss? Say that no-one was gonna hurt me? It's not like I really believed him, but... I know you can't do anything. I can't do anything. I just want you to know I'm with you. Are you with me? Please?_

"Sure you don't wanna stay, Twist?" Alf's coder was staticky with laughter. 1881 turned away. 4144 held out one of the chips. 1881 shrank away from it.

"Take the fucking money, '81. Beta's in two hours, Lenno's running tonight, get yourself something for your nerves." The trooper snatched the chip and walked out the door.

...

It was stupid, he knew, to feel betrayed. Just minutes ago, his relationship to the squad was clear. They were enemies. He didn't know their names, just that they were all his enemies. Then Alf showed up and disrupted the dynamic. He'd heard the guards' names, and he'd seen Alf for a bully and a common enemy. And he'd felt, for a second back there, like they were on the same side against the bully.

And then they'd literally sold him out. And he knew there hadn't been one single second where he could have trusted any one of them, but it still _felt_ like betrayal.

Maybe that's how he was supposed to feel. Maybe the whole thing was a script: bad trooper/worse trooper. Maybe they were improvising. Maybe they were just bored and fucking around.

Or maybe they really knew what they were doing, were reading him like a book, zeroing in on his weak spots. Maybe when they were done with him Eighty-one was going to come back with a soft towel and hot tea and furtive sympathy, ask him for _help_ , maybe.

_Yeah. That one might actually work on you, sucker._

...

Any kind of sex made Kylo queasy. He so habitually and efficiently blocked it out that he sometimes forgot it even went on in the Corps. He was also used to occasional bursts of fear and pain lighting up around the ship sometimes. The thought that some of these assaults might be _sexual_ enraged him. Not because he had compassion for anyone injured or terrorized, but because of the hypocrisy it would take for the Order to tolerate this kind of _indiscipline._

He already had his hands raised to throttle the whole squad where they stood, when the prisoner had some absolutely fascinating insights into his predicament.

...

_Okay, don't panic, just, just imagine it's a scene. A really, really intense scene. And it sounds like they don't have much time, so. Can't be any worse than that time on Bespin, right, kiddo?_

_..._

_That time on Bespin?_ Kylo gently tugged at the memory already close to the surface, and was revolted. Poe Dameron. Hell. Had been in a stim-fueled orgy on Bespin? That had taken days to recover from? And his feelings about it were _fond_? Fond enough to cling to like a pillow while the troopers assaulted him? _Damnation, he's as perverted as they are._

[If one asked Kylo all the ways Poe's memory was different than what he currently endured, he would first cite the drugs and the xenos. Then maybe the fact that most of those participating were doing so on their own time, not _on shift_ when they were supposed to be extracting intel. If it were pointed out that Poe had _wanted_ to be there, he would wonder why, then, he felt differently about the troopers. Consent had never been part of Kylo's experience. Of anything. Ever, in his life. Strength and passion were the virtues he lived by. And from where he was standing, Poe was showing admirable strength. The troopers, on the other hand, seemed neither to hate nor truly desire their enemy. They fell on him as if they were pilfering extra rations from captured cargo.]

...

_Breathe. Slower._

_Okay, I met these guys... in... uh... they asked me if I'd ever been into stormtrooper play. That's it. And I stupidly said yes. And here we are. With their frighteningly accurate costumes in their terrifyingly convincing dungeon._

_C'mon kid, you can do this. You have literally watched porn about this. Asshole._

...

He watched Poe convince himself he could stop this if he really needed to, watched him cling to being offended by the pain and rough handling, rather than feeling panicked and helpless. Like this was something they were _going to have to talk about,_ afterward. 

And he saw regretful thoughts of his _father_ flicker through the man's mind, a not-fully enunciated notion that _Han Solo would have talked his way out of this before it went this far, or got himself shot trying. Is that what I should have done? No, no, I did the right thing, I did what I trained to do..._

And, Kylo noticed, his heart rate was dropping considerably. Without any good reason. He was fascinated with how Poe was handling himself. His mind was drifting from his imaginary scenarios to something more abstract. It was like he was - was he _meditating_?

It wasn't like any kind of meditation Kylo had ever seen. There was something like a warm, steamy ocean in his mind, and he was ... offering himself to it, as if to drown in it. Blocks of ice - pain, panic, shame - bubbled up from below, shoving him violently out of the warmth. He fought his way back down into it, and the weapon with which he fought resembled nothing so much as _obedience._ It was like nothing the knight had ever seen. Ye gods. If he'd had such defenses... he resisted the urge to kneel against the wall.

 

* * *

 

 

The troopers re-armored and dragged the prisoner to his feet. He'd lost track of who was who. Sergeant Numbers was finishing his report. Poe tried to scour the taste from his mouth, but it was so dry he could hardly move his tongue.

“Re.man..ded.. to Lord.. Ren...”

So that was that. These guys were done with him. They'd never intended to even try to interrogate him. Wasn't that a kick in the teeth.

All that IVARS training. That was. Fucking hilarious. This would make a great fucking lesson someday, in the alternate timeline where he lived to see 40 and was semi-retired and a part-time SERE instructor, training a new generation to face an enemy _he_ didn't comprehend.

Apparently, this wasn't the first time he'd been tortured for nothing.

Fucking hilarious.

 

“...en..hannced.. in..terr..og-”

“I could really use some water.”

The sergeant stopped.

_You got this, you magnificent smartass._

“Feel like I should at least gargle before I meet your boss.”

“Fucking hell." His shoulders slumped a little. "For fuck's sake boys, let him use the fresher.” The trooper at his right pushed his shoulder, so Poe was facing him.

“Good idea. People sometimes piss themselves in front of him.” It was hard to tell through the coder, but it didn't sound like the trooper was mocking him. More like a heads up, one soldier to another. Poe winced at him in utter incomprehension of what went on inside those helmets.

He gathered his thoughts as he drank and pissed and washed as well as he could.

_What was it Lando had said, all those years ago?_

_"You find the right person, you can have them eating out of the palm of your hand.”_

So far none of these assholes seemed like _the right person_. Except maybe Eighty-one, who was about to go off-shift and drug himself into a stupor, if he'd understood correctly. Pretty sure any hope in this situation was a delusion. He decided he was ok with being delusional.

They dragged him to the next room and toward a shiny, bondage-y apparatus. He allowed himself to crack wise, now, asking if they knew where he could get one of those for his quarters, “you know, for entertaining?”

“Afraid Lord Ren isn't as entertaining as we are.”

_Right._

“I don't suppose you could just-” Poe snapped his head to the side and slumped, in imitation of being shot in the head.

“Sorry, scum. Wish I could.”

They'd started to file out when one of them turned around, stepped right up to Poe, and punched him square in the nose. He heard the cartilage crunching, felt the pain in the palms of his hands and the soles of his feet long before the nerves in his face came back online. Brain reeling, he didn't see 4144 stiffen and stare at his own arm, or hear his apology.

"Sorry," the trooper said, "I don't know why I did that."

 

 


	3. I Saw Black and My Face Splash Across the Sky

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> No one reacts *well* to a Force interrogation.

* * *

 

It wasn't long til the adrenaline was wearing off, and the pain was asserting itself. Everywhere. And then he must have passed out, because he didn't see the knight enter. Just blinked, and he was there. And on the other side of the blink, his eyes wouldn't open all the way, and his face stung and throbbed.

“Comfortable?”

Poe winced up at him resentfully, then closed his eyes again.

Kylo wasn't sure the busted nose had been a good idea after all. The pilot had to breathe through his split, bloody lips. Just barely open, trying to conserve moisture, just a crack. It was hard to look away from. It was supposed to have made him _less_ attractive.

Eager to resolve the business part of the interview, Kylo skipped any further formalities and tore directly into the rebel's mind.

...

Lightning seared through Poe's skull, its flashes illuminating memories. Random, at first. Friends, family, lovers. Leia. Cities, landscapes, home. Leia. Flying, lots of it. Different craft, across the years of his life. Academy. Navy. Resistance. Leia.

He'd been trained to avoid thinking about classified knowledge, to think away from it. But this wasn't thinking. This wasn't even remembering. This was having his head pried open and individual neurons turned in front of a microscope.

He was flying, reliving the feel and sound and smell of every ship he'd ever flown. A-wings. X-wings. _Rapier One._ _Black One._ The burning flashes converged, slowly, toward a point in time:

Last month, joyriding with Karé, chasing the sunset after wildfires in the northern hemisphere.

Last week, Alpha rota, milk run in the clunky freighter  _Mistflower_.

Two days ago, prepping the _Bluebird_ , the unregistered X-wing he'd taken to meet _the objective._

Flying the _Bluebird._

 

He tried to scramble back in time, to pry himself out of the _Bluebird'_ s cockpit and back into _Black One,_ back into the freighter. Any ship, a shuttle, a fucking speeder, anything.

But then he couldn't remember what those things looked like anymore, or what their names were.

He just knew he had to get out of the _Bluebird._

He couldn't remember where he was trying to get to. Besides _out._

There was only one thing to do, eject, not even wait for reentry; he didn't need to survive; he just needed to _get out_ and _not land this ship_. But he couldn't move his hand to hit the safety. Couldn't move. He imagined the _snap, click, snap_ of the safety, willed it to happen, begged the warnings in the corners of the HUD to light, tried to pull the lever anyway, but his hand wouldn't do that either, nothing, just the orange glow of reentry and then the yellow surface filling his view.

Nor would the yoke respond to any suicidal maneuvers. After landing he tried with all his might to _run_ , just run off into the endless, indistinguishable dunes, but his feet shuffled toward the village in the slow, trancelike gait he'd practiced so as not to call attention to himself.

The whole mission played in his skull like a holo he couldn't shut off, until he was crouched beside Bee, inserting the map: _You take this. It's safer with you_ _than it is with me. You get as far_ _away from here as you can! D'you_ _hear me?_ And then Bee was speeding away at approximately mark 215 from the landing coordinates.

 

And then he was back in the cell, the ghost of his blaster rifle slipping from his hands. He stared at the space between them as if the image of BB-8 and eir trajectory were an object he could hope to snatch back.

As if the damage could be undone.

Kylo watched the slightest animation return to the prisoner's jaw and fingers as he begged the Universe to _rewind._

_Just rewind, just a few seconds. That didn't go right, I can do better._

Watched horror and regret pouring into him as he realized it wasn't going to rewind. _He's going to cry._ The pilot shook as he gulped in air, squeaking as the air squeezed through his constricted throat, the shape of a wail that didn't come. His eyes filling, the man sucked air through his teeth and muttered _No_ again and again as if he'd just watched someone he loved killed in front of him.

 _Close enough_ , thought Kylo.

He paused to watch tears slowly leak out of the swollen nose, carrying tiny flecks of blood, rejoining the flood on his cheeks, dripping over a wretched grimace.

Watched the prisoner look up to the heavens, try to unclench his teeth long enough to vocalize the abject _I'm sorry_ that screamed in his mind, in his soul. Give up and slump forward, still weeping.

No one reacted _well_ to a Force interrogation. Indignation, always. Anger. Guilt, sometimes, more often shame. Most of them had asked, vocally or not, to be allowed to die by their own hand. For honor.

 

This, though, this was some kind of grief. The abject loneliness of a soul divorced from the galaxy. Like every tendril and rootlet of the Force had pulled out of him at once, leaving him porous and bloodless.

It was too familiar to Kylo; he'd lived in that place for years. Wouldn't wish it on his worst enemy.

They didn't need to be enemies, though, not now. There was Darkness in the pilot, he could taste it. He could draw it out, nourish it, fill the empty spaces, take away some of the pain. It would fill him eventually anyway, if he lived.

He wanted to meditate with the pilot, to understand how the protective cocoon he'd knitted around himself earlier could be made from weaknesses like _emptiness_ and _obedience._

 

He tilted the rack back, enough to let Poe's head rest, but not so much as to keep his nose from draining. He moved to wipe some of the mess off of Poe's face, but in response the pilot shrank away and hissed, “Don't _touch_ me!”

Kylo tilted his head.

“As you wish.”

“I. Hate. You. I fucking hate you.”

**Good.**

Poe stopped abruptly and stared at the source of the voice in his head. He hadn't pulled _that_ trick in the interrogation. Eyes wide, jaw slack, he wondered, _what fresh new fucking hell is this._

If he could have seen through the mask, he would have seen Kylo smiling fondly.

“You may be lost to the Light, Poe Dameron, but you needn't be lost to the galaxy.”

He opened his mouth to make a smart rejoinder, but words failed him.

 **Rest,** the knight commmanded, and his body obeyed.

  

...

 

Rest was fitful, though. Everything hurt. His face. His ribs. His wrists. His ass. His back. Even his guts felt twisted.

His heart. It hurt. Physically. Like a blade slashing and hacking at his chest. It was his heart, not as a metaphor, but the actual muscle that circulated blood and kept him alive. He'd heard of people dropping dead of heart failure after sudden and profound grief, and wondered if that was what was happening to him.

_Please, Force, if you can hear me at all, do it, let this be the end of this, please._

 

 

 

 


	4. Amarum et Decorum Est

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Alone and incapacitated, Poe tends first to his physical wounds, with the only analgesic available to him. Only then is he ready to address the moral wound Kylo has inflicted. The cure for all of these conditions is the same.

* * *

 

Ren's suggestion to **rest** lasted a little while, but he barely lost consciousness. Soon pain was nipping at his awareness, demanding attention, and the soldier in him was inventorying his wounds and prescribing treatments.

It had been long enough to objectively assess his injuries. His wrists: he flexed his fingers and bought sharp, hot pain, but not quite localized enough to indicate fractures. It would've been nice to be able to wrap them, but. His ribs: probably a couple of fractures, but it's not like he could've done anything for them in the best of circumstances.

His nose: that was a problem. Not like he needed his pretty face anymore - look where that had gotten him - but he couldn't breathe through it. Breathing through his mouth was going to dehydrate him twice as fast, and that's no way to go: headaches, pissy attitude, UTI, kidney failure. He strongly doubted he was going to sass his way into another fresher break anytime soon.

Double vision, absurd thoughts flitting around and interrupting his inventory: concussion. At least the bondage-y thing held him upright.

And there was still the sharp, slashing pain in his chest. He could only hope it was his heart screaming for oxygen as it strangled and starved itself.

...

  
There were exercises he did in the cockpit, on long flights, to avoid neuralgia and thrombosis. He had even less latitude to move, here. He could squirm a little, and wiggle his fingers and toes.

Thrombosis had always been a funny word to him. It sounded more like a name for a bass instrument than an emergent medical condition. But here in a First Order brig, it sounded like the name of the angel that could escort him to the sweet hereafter. A big fat blood clot to stop his heart. Or maybe an unattended stroke.

He could feel the wings wrapping around him, the voice lifting him out of his body,

_I'm here, Poe. It's me, Thrombosis. It's gonna be okay. They're not gonna get any more out of you. We're leaving here, you and me._

...

  
But his self-assessment was really just a distraction, from the only thing that mattered. Which was the magnitude of the failure of his mission. How much damage the First Order would do if they caught Bee. How he'd let the Resistance down, let the goddamn galaxy down. It wasn't just a personal failure; people would get hurt. People he loved, and people he didn't even know. Leia.

His thoughts leapt away from her like a nerf from a stun-fence. He wasn't ready to think about her.

...

  
He needed it, now. His one abiding id-born analgesic. The only thing that could take him away from here, the only thing powerful enough to take away the pain and grief. As powerful as any chemical narcotic, and just as addictive.

He'd stopped, cut way back, anyway, when he'd realized he'd been abusing it. But right now, hell, it hurt so bad, and he was dying anyway, or at least he hoped he was. It might even be the last time.

...

  
Usually when he did this, in a bunk or a cot or his ruck on the ground, usually he would pull his arms into the small of his back, fingertips to elbows, or as close as he could reach, depending on what condition he was in. Here, all he could do was tilt his head back a little more.

_He's on his back, arms bound behind him. A man crouches over him; they suck one another gently, just tasting, just warming up. Orgasm is so far away they can't even smell it yet, like a deer in the woods, while they are still settling into position. It's nice._

The world started to drop away.

_They're not alone._

[Every single time, if only for a fraction of a second, he feels ashamed that all of the players in his fantasy are human. It's just that, xeno sex can get complicated and awkward, and this is his sick narcotic deathwish fantasy. It's fucked up, but he needs it, and he needs it to go smoothly, and not get derailed by the details of incompatible anatomy. But always, even if just for a millisecond, he feels shitty about it.]

_A pair of feet straddling him turn into a pair of knees, and his partner kneels back to let someone else at Poe's cock. His man settles over his face, stroking himself casually, allowing Poe to suck at his balls._

_He hardly even notices the newcomer, so enthralled by the scrotum above him, losing track of time. More feet arrive, and his man leans back to address someone standing in front of him. His asscheeks close over Poe's face, and Poe turns his head to the side, tearing his face away so he can breathe. The man notices, sits up a little straighter, nudges Poe's elbow with his knee in apology. Poe cranes his neck to get back to the man's balls._

_Someone- the person that had been sucking him? Someone else? -is working their fingers into him. “Don't fuck me, just use your hand, nice and slow, all the way,” he wishes, and, since it's his damn fantasy, that's what they do, they take their sweet time getting their hand inside him. So slow, so confident, so nearly painless it's not really even arousing, it's just nice._

_So nice, the sensation of being stuffed full at both ends, not even moving, really, just stuffed like a fucking roast._

 

[Half the time he falls asleep at this point.]

An observer would have seen: his head lolling, his knees pulling as far apart as the restraints allow, his pelvis undulating, as slow and deep as ocean waves on a planet with a massive single moon. His blood pressure is dropping, his respiration is shallow but every few breaths he makes up for it with a little gasp. He has an erection, but he doesn't seem to be aware of it.

 

_More people are showing up to the scene, into each other, standing and kneeling over and around him. He's afraid his man is going to leave, doesn't want him to, so with great effort he takes both balls into his mouth, works his lips up to tighten around the skin above them. He can breathe just fine through his nose, but he gags a little on the size and the hairs; he moves them around in his mouth til he's comfortable. Still, he convulses a bit - it's not gagging, exactly, but something like it. No one seems to notice._

_Someone's crawling on top of him, straddling his stomach; they must be going down on his man, yes, their chins graze together, their lips just an inch apart. His man leans back, smothering him again. This time he can't break away. He shakes his head, and his man just presses down harder, maybe he thinks he's coming, not begging for air. Or maybe doesn't even remember he's there._

 

An observer would have seen: Poe stiffen and shudder in the restraints, sucking his tongue back into his throat, choking himself a little. His pulse spikes for a moment, circulating oxygen. [Poe had no idea about the tongue thing until he did this once in a crowded field hospital with a shortage of pain meds. The patient next to him saw him stop breathing and shook him awake. That was when he decided to try to quit.]

 

_His man squirms enough that he can occasionally get a tiny sip of air through his nose, but he won't last long like this. The person straddling him rests some of their weight on his chest... making room for someone to sit on his cock, that feels good... but there's more weight on him, on his chest, and his stomach, he can hardly inhale anyway, even if he can stay alert enough to anticipate the little sips, which he can't._

_He pries his eyes open to take one last look at the curve of his man's ass, so close now he can hardly see anything else. He's aware of the unresolved light and shadow of other bodies around them, and of the blackness closing in around the periphery of his vision. As the blackness claims him, he sees it all, from above, a squirming pile of lust and heat and at the bottom of it all, unnoticed by anyone, his still and painless body._

 

* * *

 

 

One hour and twenty minutes later he woke clear-eyed and clear-minded, after a full, if accelerated, sleep cycle: a textbook combat nap. He knew exactly where he was, and what he had to do.

The room was dark. He unfocused his vision, tried to picture her. Instead, the darkness resolved into flecked black and grey. A wall? Granite? No... tarmac. Tarmac, inches from his face.

_I'm sorry._

On his hands and knees, before him he can just see her standard-issue combat boots. He's never wanted anything more than he does now to press his forehead to the leather toes, to clutch her ankles, to beg her forgiveness.

_I'm so sorry._

Instead he drops his forehead to the rough tarmac, holds out his crossed wrists.

_I won't resist._

Did Bee survive? Please, please tell me you found em...

She says nothing.

Would they- would they send his body home? Would anyone even want it?

_Please, I'm sorry!_

A crowd is starting to gather around them.

_Say something, please! I don't want you to forgive me. Just, say something!_

She turns and walks back toward the hangar.

_No, please! I'm sorry!_

The crowd is murmuring, as they approach and surround him.

_I'm sorry!_

...

 

[He knows that what he is about to do is unfair to his comrades. They will know that he fought with everything he had. They will cherish the memory of him, not curse it. But he needs this, now.]

 ...

 

"Get up."

He rises back up onto his hands and knees, moves a foot to start to stand, and is kicked hard in the ribs, and falls back down.

"I said get up."

He tries again, and is kicked again.

He knows it's what he deserves: to be condemned, disowned, erased. More importantly, it's what they deserve: to avenge their hero. That hero is dead, and the wretch before them is the man that killed him.

"Ya mighta just got us all killt, least ya can do is look me in the eye and apologize like a proper sentient."

Hands. Knees. Kick.

Then someone is kicking his legs open, and he tenses for a kick in the balls before a voice behind him says, "Not there; he probably likes it."

He's hauled up by the back of his shirt, can't get his feet under him, hangs there choking on his collar for a moment til he gets his footing.

"You know who _didn't_ talk?"

Sharp yank by the hair, forcing him to look up into disgusted faces.

"Crossar."

  _[They didn't actually know for sure. Crossar had been sucked into a grav beam; they'd been on red alert for days after. His fellow-pilots were suited up and ready to scramble, but other than that they'd had little to do to consume their nervous energy, or to express grief for someone that was probably still alive, but that they'd never see again. So they held vigil on the edge of the tarmac, a bunch of mutes trying intently to feel the Force flowing through and around them, to project strength and serenity out to their captured comrade._

_A week later, a small supply freighter was attacked and destroyed, but it wasn't of real strategic importance, and nothing else happened after that, so the consensus was that it was a coincidence, and that Crossar had died as bravely as he'd lived.]_

 

At the mention of their fallen friend's name, he feels his arms pulled out, opening him up to their fists. A sharp one to his gut, knocking the wind out of him. One to his face, while he's still gulping futilely. Another.

"You know who _wouldn't_ have talked?"

[Again his conscience protests,  _conjecture!_ \- a muffled cry from behind a locked door.]

" _Captain_ Branna."

  _[Branna had been an exceptional pilot and leader, and Poe had recommended her to take over command of Blue squadron. In the absence of a military college to send her to, she'd been studying strategy and intelligence with the Resistance command. She was a few weeks away from the promotion when she was blown to dust in an ambush.]_

 

"It should have been me," he croaks.

"Damn straight."

A heavy blow knocks the wind out of him yet again, his legs collapse. The names of the fallen ring in his ears. The blows fall on him now like a summer hailstorm. His whole body ringing with pain and condemnation. His lungs burn, they won't open, they're going to kill him.

He welcomes the rough cradle of the tarmac as he collapses fully onto it. Every time he's kicked, his cheekbone scrapes across it, tearing skin away, grinding gravel in. _What a mess_ , he thinks sadly.

He sees Ileenium hanging low in the sky, just touching the treetops, glowing red in the thick haze of the atmosphere, red as the blood that fills his mouth. Someone's still stomping his hips and thighs. And his right flank, his liver. But the boots around his head and shoulders are still, staring down at his pulpy face, watching his lips working like a fish's tossed up on a dock, trying to suck air into his lungs. But his bruised diaphragm just won't move, and his lungs won't fill.

_I'm so sorry._

The soldiers wander away in twos and threes, bitter and sullen. When he pulls away from himself this time, it's not from above that he sees his body, but from across the landing strip. The tarmac is still warm from the heat of the day. The heat rises and mixes with the chill breeze rolling down from the wooded hills.

Ileenium is huge and red; it hangs over the crumpled body at the end of the runway. He shivers, and knows that it will hang at this altitude for the rest of his life.

 


	5. Your Thoughts Betray You

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Kylo presents his opening arguments.

* * *

 

Kylo awoke to the sense that the sun itself was setting right there in his room. An ominous chill chased the sleep-warmth from his skin. He smiled. Poe was sleeping, dreaming. Processing. Healing.

He'd like to let him sleep longer, but they had to make the most of the time they had together. He was confident he could keep Poe hidden and forgotten for as long as he needed to, but it was surely just a short matter of time before he was called away to fight Skywalker. 

...

He sat across from the rack and gently planted the suggestion that Poe was not alone, so as not to startle him. Poe floated close to the surface of consciousness. He was both delicious and sickening, aching and mournful but still tinged with hypnagogic arousal. Kylo blocked the latter to the extent that it existed in the Force. He couldn't block his other senses, though. He was sure he could _taste_ the man from across the room.

**Please wake up.**

He waited for Poe to wake to his surroundings, to sense again the man who steeled himself to his duty with thoughts of suicide and self-mutilation. But those notions were mere artifice, responses to circumstance. What he sensed now was so, so much more promising. There was darkness in every soul, and it was strong in this one. He'd spent a lifetime repressing it, hiding it behind baffles and sweeping it into blind, barren niches. Now it was waking to its own unexpected freedom. Stretching and flexing and creeping out into fresh territory. This was going to be easier than he thought. 

He felt Poe's heart sink as he became aware again of where he was and what had happened.

 

“You dream loudly, pilot.”

“Don't call me that.”

“It's not an insult.”

_Of course it fucking isn't._

“It's not true. Not anymore.”

“You don't think you will live to fly again.”

_No, asshole. He was the best part of me, the part that gave a fuck, and he's gone. You fucking killed him._

"Doesn't matter. I'm dead to them anyway."

“I imagine so. Are they dead to you?”

_I guess they'll be dead for real soon enough._

Soon enough. Right. They didn't even know, yet. They were still living in the same galaxy he had left them in.

"They still love me," he whispered, to himself. Not meaning: despite his failure. Meaning: because they didn't know, yet. It was a mistake to let the thought slip out of his mouth; Kylo pounced on it.

"Love," he scoffed. "Two galactic wars have taught your people nothing, then."

_Galactic wars...?_

Poe looked confused and offended.

“How do you not understand by now!" Kylo turned on him, furious. "You say you value love? It is the Light that rejects it!”

Poe spluttered, too bemused to stay offended. “You don't think the people in that village loved each other?”

“You know _nothing_ of the Cult of the Force.”

“The families you tear apart with your kidnappings,” Poe snarled through bared teeth.

“That is the work of the First Order.”

“Yeah - the fucking Dark Side.”

“The Order is not Dark. _**I**_  am Dark.”

_What the fucking jive-ass bantha shit..._

“Isn't this,” Poe waved his fingers as expansively as pain would allow, “your operation?”

“No. We serve the same Master, but we are not the same.” Poe could hear disdain, even through the voice box.

“You're one of those fucking _knights_.”

“I am Master of the Knights of Ren.”

“You killed those children.”

“At the temple? I assure you, no love was lost that day. The Jedi reject it even more dogmatically than these bureaucrats.” Kylo nodded up, indicating the whole of the ship they were on.

“What about their families!”

“They were already lost to their families.”

“What! You killed a friend of mine!”

“Really?” Ren paused. “A _friend_?”

“Our... our families were friends.” Well. “I mean, his mother, anyway.”

“And if he hadn't been murdered? What then? Today you would be fast friends? He'd be frantic over your current disappearance?”

“No, of course not, he was...” _going to become a Jedi._

“You see? He was already lost to you.”

This seemed, somehow, self-evident. But it also contradicted everything he thought he knew. Some force-wielder mind trick? He was pretty sure he wasn't what anyone would call _weak-minded_ , although he was pretty worn down right at the moment.

 

“Would you feel better knowing that your _friend_ is only dead in the sense that your pilot is dead?”

Poe's capacity for surprise must have just reached its limit, because he absorbed this information - which the day before would have turned his world upside down - with little shock, like the way facts shift on spice or in a dream.

“So, what, he works for _you_ now? Or,” he rolled his eyes, “ _serves_ you, or whatever you call it?”

They had closed in on this question much faster than Kylo intended. He'd meant to tease out what Poe remembered of Ben, thoughts he was _sure_ were going to hurt, and to poke at them for hours like a rotten tooth. But Poe - both of them, really - had lasered in on it with the precision of a sharpshooter. He looked for a long time at Poe, not vacillating exactly, just holding on to this last moment. And Poe - as moments passed, he knew what was about to happen. It wasn't a sudden realization; it was just the truth now, where it hadn't been before.

Kylo pulled back his hood and lifted off his mask. His pale face met Poe's battered one.

...

 

Poe had so many questions.  _How did this happen? Who did this? This 'Supreme Leader?' Who is he? What did he do to you? How did you get here?_  He didn't know where to start. And Ben wasn't about to give him the space to collect his thoughts. He pounced again.

“Tell me more about the _ex-pilot_. Tell me who you are without your Resistance to fight for.”

 _Tell me_  didn't mean  _talk to me._  It meant,  _I'm going to look at you now._ He already knew where to look.

 

_The ex-pilot. That whore. I'm gonna miss that guy._

He really was. The thought of dying here, on a godsdamned Star Destroyer, was beyond depressing. Death felt real and close and final and regrettable.

He'd had _plans_ for that guy. Or rather, _it_ had plans. It, that something beckoning him downward, that thing that wanted to drag him _not just below the surface but down the fucking drain._

He'd seen them: vets, dropouts, assorted fuckups, in out of the way cantinas, silently drinking themselves to death. Replaying their failures over and over in their minds. This was where the downward pull would take him, he had been sure. Something would happen, he would fuck up somewhere along the way. Too badly to get over. He wasn't generally someone who dwelt on his failures, nor was he especially prone to addiction. But he could feel it pulling, gently, patiently, like it wasn't quite trying to turn him, but rather was ready to catch him when everything else fell apart.

And he knew exactly how he would come up with the credits to drink himself to death. He knew he was good-looking. Not lacking for talent, either. Maybe he'd do a little smuggling here and there. But mainly he expected to end up turning increasingly risky tricks until his luck or his liver ran out. Losing all force-damned respect for himself would be such a blessed relief, when the time came.

It comforted him. It shouldn't, he knew. But it did. Maybe it was comforting just to have a Plan B, regardless how terrible. Maybe it was comforting to establish a limit for just how bad things were likely to get for him.

 _Likely,_ apparently, had a sense of humor. Because how likely was it he'd end up here, with the living ghost of one of the galaxy's most famous martyrs, Ben goddamn Solo, trying to convert him to the fucking Dark side. And, honestly, standing a middling chance, because that singular, irrecoverable fuckup had just occurred.

 

"So you already know, then. That you are bound to the Dark, destined for it."

"Destined. Ha!"

He had to laugh. However miserable his thoughts were, the word itself was impossible to take seriously. He'd watched the _Restoration Trilogy_  a dozen times. He and his friends knew Vader's pickup lines by heart:

_"Give yourself to the Dark side."_

_"It is your destiny."_

_"Search your feelings, you know it to be true."_

They intoned them to one another in the face of minor temptations: One too many drinks at the end of a night. Inadvisable dates. Hell, one too many cupcakes might be one's _destiny_. Whatever chills the words gave children watching the series for the first time, they were warm and familiar to adults, a basis for easy bonhomie across the galaxy.

He felt sanguine for a moment, until he realized that he would never feel that warmth and bonhomie again. A fresh wave of cold loneliness washed over him.

"But you needn't be alone."

"Are you really doing this? Seriously?"

"I have seen the darkness in you. I see that it comforts you."

This was not something he could honestly deny. But.

"I think you saw me pissed off. I think you saw me in this shitty situation in this shitty war."

Lightning flashed again. He rarely went so far as to actually fantasize about what it would be like,  _down the drain_. But there were snippets, vignettes. Pictures of himself, blind drunk in some Outer Rim cantina, kneeling under tables, taking anything put in front of him, being dragged into back rooms, waking up... waking up dead.

"So? So what. You saw a lot of sex," he shrugged, deliberately, doing his best to suggest that this was no big fucking deal. "That comforts me." 

"They are often the same, for you."

" _No,_ " he insisted, sounding a little more defensive than he would have liked. There was nothing necessarily dark about - _What? Whipping? Cutting? Choking? Begging? Having your own name denied to you?_  

"How can you even tell?" Poe countered. "Aren't you... you know?"

Seriously, if there were such a thing as sounding like a virgin.

"I am. "

"Is that a... choice? For you?"

"I can't really tell anymore."

Poe couldn't think of a response to that. 

"It's no matter. I have no interest. I am interested only in your power."

"My...?"

"I saw the way you meditated to protect yourself when you were attacked. How you healed yourself after we fought. It's powerful."

_After we "fought." Interesting choice of words._

_And also: Oh. That._

He struggled for a moment to save face, to make some joke or excuse for himself, but there was no hiding anything from this thing that Ben had become. Even if there were anything in him worth trying to hide. What was Ben going to do? Laugh at him? Okay. Ben could laugh at him. He deserved it, probably.

"I'm sorry. That's not a _power_. That's, what I guess you could call. Kind of," _an inappropriate use of subspace. Gods, fuck me. There's a reason normal people don't talk about their happy places._

"Yeah, I guess it's kinda like meditation. That's not, really, how you're supposed to do it. I'm certainly not proud of myself."

He certainly wasn't.

"I just - couldn't be here. With everything. Happening. To me. Here. So I kinda, checked out for a while. I'm sorry. If I - if you misunderstood."

 **"Show me."** Kylo spoke aloud, but his voice rang in Poe's head, too.

_No._

_Nope._

"So, um, when you said you had no interest. In, you know, sex. That's kind of how it works."

"You are _interested_ in your General?"

"No! No, I guess it doesn't _have_ to be like that, okay."

Kylo was silent. Poe stared at the polished floor, feeling stupid because, he thought, Ben had overestimated him. He tried just to be glad not to have anything left to hide.

Kylo let him sit in the most  _worthless_  part of stupid until he felt it. The faintest little catch of anxiety. Wanting Kylo to talk to him again, even if it was to mock him or lie to him. Kylo knew _exactly_ how that felt, and exactly how long to let it go before it turned to irritation.

"I saw your deathwish. I feel it pulling at you now. It has been there a long time."

_Always. Since before I can remember._

"Would you like to try to remember?"

Kylo allowed a wisp of happiness to attend the word _remember_.

Poe should have shuddered at the thought of Ben entering his mind again. But then - the thought of being made whole again before he died. To remember a time before regret and failure, before loneliness and loss. Surely anything Ben proposed was, at the least, not in his best interest. But there was no tactical information that far in the past; whatever harm came would come to Poe alone, and, in what was quickly becoming his mantra, or maybe his epitaph, he fucking deserved it.

He imagined himself decades hence: crippled and grey, shackled in this same cell, eyes glittering in reverie, birds chirping inside his greasy grey skull as a child rolled endlessly in soft green grass.

 

"We can stop anytime you wish."

"Will it hurt? Like last time?"

"No."

Poe closed his eyes and felt himself nodding.

 

 

 


	6. Throwing Shadows On Our Eyes

* * *

 

They played Rebel Alliance on the playground, playing the heroes of the war against the Galactic Empire. Sometimes re-enacting real battles, sometimes making them up. There were so many heroes to play, living and lost. Sometimes kids played Poe's parents. He never did; that would've been weird, but it was fun to watch kids imitating their mannerisms. He liked playing Leia Organa, even besides the fact that it let him brag that he'd met her. He liked the scene where she was captive on the first Death Star:

“Inject me. With the torture serum.”

“Okay. Psst.”

“Tch, no. Poke me, with a stylus or something. No, hard. Like it's a needle.”

“I can't cut you, I'll get in trouble.”

“Okay but you have to torture me. The serum hurts your whole body.”

“I can't do that. Just pretend.”

“Just, like, pinch me all over, okay? I won't tell anyone.”

 

He liked playing Han Solo, too, when Han was rescued from Jabba's palace. He'd close his eyes and stand motionless, hands raised in an invisible carbonite tomb, while the other kids ran around and battled rancors. Even if they took a long time and his arms started to ache, he rarely peeked. Han had been blind, at first, and so he didn't open his eyes when the other kids liberated him, making them pull and nudge to steer him, and catch him when he tripped. He liked being helpless and manhandled by his friends. He trusted them.

He saw the sunlight blotchy through his eyelids. Felt friendly hands in his, and on his arms and shoulders, guiding him to safety. They faded quickly with Kylo's retreat, leaving Poe in the cold and dread of the star destroyer.

“Please,” he whispered, “bring it back. Please.”

 

* * *

 

 

He had lots of friends, but he wished there was someone special, someone else who liked playing torture as much as he did. Someone he could bring home, or maybe out to the woods, willing to play for real, to give him bruises, to break the skin. But he was pretty sure that anyone he asked wouldn't just say _No_ , but also stop playing with him altogether, and maybe even tell other kids how weird he was.

He wondered if maybe they were right, maybe there was something wrong with wanting to play that way. After all, the Empire really had tortured people, and used the information they got to coerce, deprive and murder countless souls. Which meant he could count guilt among his feelings, along with loneliness and frustration. He figured he could eventually make peace with being a weirdo, but he didn't want to be _evil_.

 

* * *

 

 

After his mother died, he lost all interest in playing rebel alliance, or any other playground games. It would be a long time before he wanted anything from his friends but solid, reassuring hugs.

 

* * *

 

 

He hiked alone into the forest. He had carefully sharpened and cleaned the blade on the little knife in his pocket, but he was still a little afraid of it, so when he spotted some sharp-edged rocks in a little hillside, he felt relieved, _pardoned_ almost. He picked one out, one that felt good in his hand, and carried it with him. He caressed its sharpest edges with his fingertips, and felt his heart flutter.

He stopped at nice mossy spot, soft but not too damp. Knelt down and felt the forest around him: the thick organic smells of the understory, the wind in the treetops high above, the symphonically complex birdsongs. He took his shirt off and laid down on the moss. Ferns curved up around him; he imagined they were swallowing him. He breathed and listened and let the forest absorb him. He caressed the sharp edges of his stone, stoking the ache that seemed to be everywhere and nowhere in his body. He traced the sharpest edge gently against all the places he couldn't cut himself, places the cuts would show- his arms, his throat, his face.

He picked another surface, one that was rough-sharp, not knife-sharp, and tested the feel of it against his chest. It felt good. The way it was making him breathe felt good, too. At the last moment, he stretched his other arm out beside him and grasped a little sapling. He pressed the stone against his chest and gouged sharply. Sucked in his next breath in stuttering little bursts. Felt his whole body spasm a little. Stared wide-eyed into the canopy for a moment before looking down at the wound.

There were a few crisp red scratches, pinhead-sized droplets peeking out. The skin around them was pale, waxy and ragged. That meant it would hurt even more in a few minutes. If there's one thing eleven year-olds know, it's abrasions. He closed his eyes and _felt._

Felt how the faintest breeze felt cold against the tender exposed flesh, breezes the the dry outer epidermis didn't even register. Felt the blood rising to the surface, pins and needles at first, maturing into loud stinging that throbbed with his pulse. Felt the sticky-wet sensation of blood separating as it started to clot. Sensed the commitment he had just made to himself- he couldn't go home until the blood dried enough to put his shirt back on.

He gouged himself two more times before he felt _done_ , both sated and empty at the same time. He rested the stone on his stomach, over his navel. The weight felt good but it wobbled when he breathed, so he tucked it halfway into his waistband. He stretched the other arm out, now, too, finding a thick stalk to hold on to. He breathed deeply, feeling the wounds crackling and puckering as his chest rose and fell, feeling the stone move up and down on his stomach. He wished it were bigger, heavy enough to hold him down, crush him a little, enough to feel the weight on his hips and -

His eyes snapped open.

 

_Oh._

 

So that's what this was.

These were _sex thoughts_.

 

_Okay._

 

For a while he didn't think, just absorbed it. Finally a few thoughts coalesced and surfaced.

One, this partly explained the embarrassment he felt about it. From what he'd picked up, most people, even happily married grown-ups, were at least a _little_ embarrassed about sex stuff. So that was normal.

Two, he was pretty sure it _wasn't_ normal to want to be hurt when you did it. The question was: was it bad? It's not like he wanted to hurt anyone else.

Three, was it something that would change when he became a teenager? Some people changed a lot at that age. Maybe he'd grow out of it?

Four, what if he didn't?

He stared blankly up at the canopy. Felt the jungle growing into him, himself dissolving into it. The ferns swathed him like a shroud, and the broadleaf understory closed over him like a living sarcophagus. High above, the birds were busy. Their work was important. Mating, nesting, hunting, protecting territory, it was all vital. The creature bleeding on the forest floor was beneath their notice.

 

* * *

 

 

Kylo was torn. So much of what he'd just seen felt so familiar, he wanted to talk to Poe, tell him everything, everything he'd never told anyone before. But he also wanted to cuff him hard and scream at him,

_You think you were weird? You felt alienated? You were afraid in some disconnected abstract way that there might be something a little bit evil in you?_

_NO. You don't get to feel that way. You were loved and admired and you still are. You're beautiful, you're brave and loyal and you make people happy without even trying. You don't get to have my life too, when I would have done anything to have yours._

 

But still. He'd been there, in the man's mind and memories, and his feelings were real and they hurt. And the real pisser was that they _could_ have been friends. Ben would _absolutely_ have been the _someone special_ Poe wanted.

He'd gone into Poe's mind expecting, hoping to find fresh resentments to stroke, old wounds to aggravate. He'd expected them to come from the man himself, memories of disdain for weak, weird little Ben.

Instead, it just confirmed the old resentments, the hatreds he already held.

They had _needed_ each other, then. But they had each other now.

 


	7. By the Time I Get to Nurra City

* * *

 

 

The first year of civic school, some of the more _mature_ girls in his class Decided they were going to be friends with him.

“Um, ok. I mean, you sure you don't have me confused with someone else?”

“All the other boys in our class are _infantile_. And most of the girls.”

“Well, I guess we all were, not that long ago.”

“I know. We're not judging. They'll catch up.”

They did all kinds of _mature_ things together. They recited Old Republic poetry. They discussed galactic politics and clucked at rumours of neo-Imperialist factions. They talked about gender and species and what sentience is, really. They practiced kissing. They attended duels, dipping their heads close and murmuring their appreciation for the older athletes.

By second year, Kora was his inseparable best friend. She really was very mature, someone who knew what she was about. Even her closest friends sometimes felt the need to be on their _best behavior_ around her, and she was only fifteen. It was no surprise she wasn't dating anyone. She had bigger things on her mind. To the extent that she payed any attention to the microsocial behavioral cues of the boys around her, it was with an eye to who might be interested in her best friend.

But. Until that guy came along. They were teenagers, after all. They had _hormones_. Oh, stars did they have hormones. And they already loved and trusted one another. So.

When she propositioned him, it was like she was reading from a textbook. _We should have some experience. Not just physical technique, but learning to communicate and find our boundaries._ But her tone and posture and eye movements made him feel special, like this rite of passage would bond the two of them forever. Of course he said yes.

...

They were making out in his room. She reached down to his ass and asked _Can I hold you here_ and he said _Yes_ and then it was just a flurry of her hands and lips and him saying _Yes Yes Yes_ until she asked if there was anything he wouldn't say Y _es_ to, and it was like he'd been sprinting and stumbled over a rock.

 _Touche_ , he thought, and grinned at her, but she wasn't smiling back.

"I'm serious, Poe."

“Kora, you're my best friend. I trust you, totally.”

“We're not always going to be with people we know so well. We should be able to talk about what we want. And don't. Tell me about, you know, what turns you on. Besides fourth-year duelists.”

The thought of telling anyone, even his best friend, about the desires he'd been repressing for so long, literally as long as he could remember, terrified him. His stomach clenched so tight he was afraid for a second he might throw up.

“I don't know; I haven't thought about it that much. I just want _you_ to feel good.”

She shook her head. Of course he couldn't bullshit her.

“You first, sweetie. I'm pretty sure I can articulate what I want. And even surer that anything I say will _somehow_ turn out to be exactly what you want. Am I wrong?”

He smiled, laughed at himself a little. She so had his number.

“Does it occur to you that I might feel the same way? About wanting to be good for you? Don't I deserve to know what you want, and the chance to give it to you?”

“Heavens, girl, you are going to be an amazing diplomat.”

“And you, sweetie, are going to do your mom real proud as a pilot. But right now, I want to see the boy that would make her blush.”

He gaped at her, feigning scandal.

“Look down and say, _damn, my boy's a sex machine, just like his Daddy.”_

“My stars and planets, young lady, do _your_ parents know you talk that way?”

[She had confessed at one point to having a little bit of a crush on Kes. Poe had said he was fine with that, on one condition: That if she ever thought about him while they were kissing, that Poe never, ever, ever have to hear about it. She'd said “Of course not, sweetie, that would be traumatizing.” And then she'd kissed him. And then made a big show of not speaking for a few minutes after, humming contentedly to herself and conspicuously avoiding eye contact.]

“But seriously. Poe. Sweetie. Tell me. Something. One thing.”

He couldn't ask her to slap him, or cut him, or choke him or anything, he couldn't, he pictured her pulling away, outraged, walking out, not answering his calls. He could feel the distress showing on his face; he had to do _something._

He took a deep breath and looked her as squarely in the eye as he could. Then hung his head and slowly, deliberately, one leg at a time, knelt in front of her. He was shaking and his breath was catching.

“Go on,” she whispered.

He looked up at her, fear naked on his face, and looked away again. He slowly folded his arms behind his back, and hung his head again. And then he was really out of what he could communicate without having to speak. Which ability seemed to have escaped him. He fought the urge to wrap himself around her thighs and beg her not to leave.

She wasn't leaving. She stepped up close to him. She slid her fingers into his hair and held his head gently. He turned his face up to meet her palm, like a kitten moving into a scratch. She was as gentle and generous as she'd be with a kitten, too, pressing her palm to his cheek and tilting his head back toward her, caressing his cheekbone with her thumb.

He imagined her slapping him hard, and at that arousal finally started to gain on insecurity.

 

Right. That's why they were here. To lose their virginity. He didn't have to tell her everything all at once. He'd done what she asked, he'd given her _one thing_. He'd trusted her, been vulnerable, was at this moment still very vulnerable. It was her turn. He looked up at her, knowing she could read his face, see that he was begging to be let off the hook.

She dropped to one knee, looked him level in the eyes. Took his chin firmly in one hand so he couldn't look away.

“Listen to me. You _have_ to tell me if I do something you're uncomfortable with. Something you don't like or that will hurt you. Do you understand?”

“Yes, Kora,” he whispered, and the sound of his own voice turned him on even more.

“You _must_ tell me. I have to be able to trust you.”

Those words hit home. Trust him too, of course. He was responsible to her, too. Of course.

“I swear, Kora, I'll tell you. I won't let you hurt me.” And then, afraid of giving the wrong impression, hastened to add, “I mean, _really_ hurt me; if you want to, um, like..."

She looked at him indulgently.

“Let me think about it some more.”

He nodded gratefully.

She seemed satisfied, but there was still a hint of skepticism in her eyes. She stood again, took a gentle fistful of hair, and pulled his face toward her fly. He opened his mouth, sucked on the dry fabric.

“Who are you thinking about?” she asked.

“Besides you?”

“I know you are, sweetie, you have to be. I think it would actually be more intimate if you could tell me.”

“I believe you. But my mind isn't really focused on like, one person. I just, ah, ha, kinda wish you were hiding a dick in there.”

She smiled lazily. “I'll tell you who I'm thinking about.”

He looked up, eyes wide, lower lip still dragging on the fabric of her pants.  He'd never seen her look bashful before.

“I'm thinking about Dev.”

"Sinder?" A fine, cute boy in their class.

"No, _Torres_." She was blushing a little. But she was right. Dev Torres. Damn. Twenty-ish, skilled mechanic, polytech dropout, wouldn't say why. Thrilling politics, sexy as hell.

“Oh, gods yes,” he breathed, and bit into her fly with newly piqued hunger.

“Can I show you? What I want to do with him?”

“ _Yeah. Please._ ”

“Lie down.” He did, and she settled over him, straddling his thighs.

“I would let him watch me for a while.” She opened her pants, hovering an inch above his erection. Reached in, looked at him for a moment and then threw her head back. The other hand tugged at a nipple through her shirt. He lifted his pelvis, trying to reach her, to grind together. She pressed down to allow it. She pulled her fingers out and sucked them loosely, looking down at him.

“I want to see you doing this,” she said, fingers caressing her lower lip. Her voice sounded ten years older. “Is that something you would do for me? Or are you turned off by -” she grasped for the right word, admitted defeat and just said, “- by girls?”

“Oh, no. I mean I don't, you know, _think_ about girls, the same way, but. I'm not turned off. At all. No.” He licked his lips, hoping she could see how much he meant it. She must have, because her hand was back in her pants, and she was crawling forward, closer to his face, some of her weight on his chest. He found her ankles, and slipped his wrists under them.

“Oh, really?” she gloated.

“ _Yes. Really, really.”_

She rubbed her wet fingertips against his lips. He opened just enough to invite her in, not so much that she didn't have to push a little. She gently worked two fingers in and out of his mouth while he tongued and sucked at them. She clenched her thumb and ring finger around his jaw. His eyes rolled back in his head.

“You want to be underneath him.”

"Nhn-hnn"

She nudged his arms and adjusted herself so she was kneeling on them, her weight concentrated on her knees. It hurt; it might even bruise, he hoped. She pushed her hand back into his mouth, three fingers this time, then four, thumb firm under his jaw. She bent down to growl in his ear.

“You want him pinning you down like this?”

_Oh fuck yes he did._

Her pelvis ground against her other hand.

"You want his hand in your mouth like this?"

"Yff."

"But what do you really want?" She pulled her hand away.

_His dick. Of course. But really. Really. His balls. Kriff._

He squeezed his eyes shut tight; he couldn't look at her. Mercifully, she pressed her ear to his lips.

"His balls," he whispered, and tremors ripped through his body as he spoke, "I want to suck his balls, Force, please."

She pushed her hand back into his mouth and he sucked at it desperately.

“You want to watch him masturbate while you do it?”

_Like nothing he'd ever wanted before._

“You want him to ejaculate in your hair?”

_Oh kriff, Dev -_

Ecstasy blossomed through his whole being. Her knees, painfully bruising his arms, her weight and her victory, his helplessness and shamelessness, the breath urgent in his nostrils. It was heaven, it was life, it was death, it was glorious.

 

* * *

 

He got better, with his vocabulary. He'd had to find the right words when he _finally_ started meeting boys, and when his partners' reactions went from, “That was so hot,” to “Are you sure you're okay?” to “Hey, I think we need to talk about what just happened.”

He learned not to spring things on people in the heat of the moment. Which thank the gods he hadn't done with Taren.

They'd made friends at the end of senior year and dated all summer, and were going to Academy and University on the same planet, where they met up almost every weekend. It was good for both of them- Taren was shy, and Poe was way too outgoing. It would've been a _terrible_ idea to start slutting around freshman year, with the people he was going to work with, in a strictly hierarchical organization, for the next few decades. So. Having a sweet boyfriend from back home kinda made sense, for now.

At the same time, the Academy was full of stone fucking panthers, and the sweet vanilla sex he had with Taren on the weekends left him aching. So he read up on some advice zines and fora on ways to gently introduce straight partners to a little kink. It all sounded pretty cheesy, but it's not like he could've asked for advice from anyone in person. Not and kept his fidelity intact.

So on a pleasant afternoon picnic, outdoors and fully clothed, he bit the bullet and flirtatiously suggested a couple of role-play scenarios, whereby Taren could dom him a little. Lightly. Nothing hardcore. Just good, clean, dirty fun. But. His boyfriend's reaction had been cold and blank.

“Oh, wait, babe, I'm sorry if I wasn't clear - _I'd_ be the prisoner. I would never ask you, you know...”

Taren shook his head a little.

"Okay! Just something I read about, I thought it sounded kinda hot. Thought it might be fun to try. Sometime. In the future. Maybe. I mean, maybe, think about it?" He waited a beat.

"I mean, really _think_ about it,” he purred the last sentence, grinning and raising his eyebrows.

"Ahm."

“I meant while you masturbate,” Poe added, deadpan, as if anyone could have thought he meant anything else. That _should have_ gotten a smile out of Taren. He was pretty sure he'd used the exact same line before and gotten a giggle.

“Okay. Um, well, then, you know, just file it with Things you know about me. Like my shoe size, and how I take my caf.” He smiled, bright and cheerful and insincere. "No biggie."

Taren's voice was steady but distant.

“I know its a thing, Poe, but... how is it _your_ thing _?_ You're such a sweetheart.”

Poe grinned, “Yes I am.”

“You're so kind, and so respectful.”

[ _Respectful_ , unfortunately, was one of those words he'd never be able to take seriously again. The previous year, another boy had tried _respectful_ in regard to the way he should conduct himself when giving head. He'd tried so hard to sound stern and commanding like Poe had asked him to, but he was seventeen and his voice was full of sunshine and candy. It had been too damn adorable; Poe had been helpless against the giggles that bubbled up from a warm spot, maybe from his heart. He'd tried to pass it off as choking, when he felt his friend convulsing too and then gasping “Ah! No! Stop!” before falling on him, the two of them collapsing in snorting laughter.]

He huffed a little laugh at just the sound of the word, but Taren was being Very Serious.

“You're so compassionate, and you know right from wrong better than anyone I know. It's what I admire about you so much! How can you...” he trailed off.

_What??_

He had to take care of his face, first. It was doing things that don't encourage trust in the person speaking to you. He finally managed to get his eyelids shut.

“Right from _wrong?_ Taren, I don't understand, I've met people who _know_ it's not wrong but still expect me to be, like, ashamed of myself. And dammit, I love you, and you think it's _wrong_? Like, morally? Seriously? Fuck.” Poe scowled.

“No, not, not wrong. Exactly.”

Neither spoke for a while, neither offered their hand.

 

 

“Poe. You _know_. People really do get assaulted in custody.”

 

 

That hit him like a brick in the face.

 

 

[After this debacle, he would think long and hard about why, exactly, he liked what he did. And, no lie, he resented having to, at first; he was even a little afraid of what he might discover. But.

He learned to admit he liked being helpless with someone he trusted, because it made him feel safe. Liked pain because it made him feel healthy and alive, and because it elevated him to something almost spiritual. He spent so much of his life staying in control, it was like a vacation to give it up, and still be safe, having his boundaries not just respected but zealously guarded, while his conscience and willpower were lightyears away.

If only he could have said all this to Taren, instead of trying some idiotic game from an insipid zine. He wanted to root through the datanet and wipe every instance of the thing.]

 

 

“You know I didn't grow up - the way you did.”

“I know,” he answered warily.

Everyone knew. Or, had known, back home. Taren's homeworld had been one of the last Imperial holdouts, and neo-imperialists held a lot of local power. Even though it was obvious his family had fled from the place, suspicion still attached to them, and it had been hard to make friends. Now that they were away at school he _never_ mentioned it to new friends, just said he was from Yavin. He didn't even like talking to Poe about it, and they'd been together for months.

“But you've heard. Stories.”

"Yeah, a little bit, it's in the news sometimes. Fucking neos getting ballsier every year. And all the, like, violence and stuff.” _And fucked-up sexual mores._

“What do you know about violence.”

“I don't. You're right. And, we've never really talked about this. It sounds like, maybe we should.”

“Well. For one thing. I wouldn't walk down the street holding your hand.”

"Yeah, I kinda got that impression."

“That's not the reason we moved though. I mean, it kind of is, but.”

“What's the reason?” he asked, cautiously.

Taren took a deep breath.

“The last straw for my parents was, my sister's friend Jira. She didn't want to get married. She wanted to finish civic school.”

“Finish? How old was she?”

“Sixteen. About when most girls drop out and get married.”

"What is that in standard years?"

Taren just stared at him darkly. 

“What the _fuck_ man, why've I've never heard _that_ fucking banthashit before! I mean, I knew it was a backwards-ass planet, but seriously?”

Taren breathed deeply. Checked his pulse with his fingers.

“She might have been able to finish school somehow. But. She met a boy. Not who her family wanted her to marry.”

_Shit._

Poe thought he probably knew how this story ended. They wrote operas about this kind of thing.

“As far as I know, all they ever did was kiss. But."

 

It was as much as he was going to say. “It changed the ... atmosphere, in our whole neighborhood. A lot of girls dropped out, even girls on Uni track. Some,” his voice cracked, “Some boys, too.

"The city attourney. He was a holdover. He probably thought she had it coming. But they had to show they were - in control, you know? So they sent up this one kid. He didn't have anything to do with it, he was just a, a pain in their ass, you know? Two birds, one bolt." He breathed deep and shaky, in, out. "He, um."

Taren fell silent, staring through his surroundings.

Poe was transfixed; he felt like a stone gargoyle.

"So. Yeah. We left. So my sister could finish school. And stuff."

 _Stuff_ meaning: not living in terror.

"I don't think they realized they were protecting me too. I mean, they do _now._ ”

He squeezed Poe's hand. Poe, whose own heart was racing, whose every muscle screamed to go beat the everloving shit out of anyone who'd ever threatened Taren or anyone he knew or cared for.

 

“I'm sorry, Poe.”

“Whut - what? Don't say that!”

“I don't really think you're wrong. I just - it would be wrong for me.”

“Oh, Force, Taren, don't even - just forget I said anything, _please_ , fuck, I'm the one who should be sorry. I mean, I _am_ sorry. I'm _so_ sorry."

_Kriffing kill me, this is the most selfish, thoughtless thing I think I've ever done, and I did it to this sweet boy that I love. Gods I wish I could undo this._

“I understand, if, you know, you don't want to, um,”

“What, be with you?!” Poe's eyes were half-out of his head.

“Yeah, I mean...”

 

What do you even say to that? When you're eighteen, and righteous, and don't have much experience hearing _No_ to begin with? All he could do was to wrap himself around Taren, and kiss his hair, and tell him he loved him, and that he wasn't going anywhere.

And when minutes later Taren whispered _I'm sorry_  once more, with a note of finality that would brook no reply, Poe was helpless, just rubbed his boyfriend's back while inside his head a storm raged. He saw red, literally. He saw himself storming the streets of Nurra City, hunting down bullies and bigots and rapists, blasters blazing, a fucking lightsaber is what he wanted, an orgy of castration and decapitation inflicted by his hands until the streets ran red with blood.

 

* * *

 

It was embarrassing to be shown how narcissistic he'd been at that age. But it also broke his heart to know that planets like that were now allied with the First Order.

“You wanted to hurt them.”

“Wouldn't you?”

“The power for revenge comes from the Dark side.”

    _Of course it does._

“It's not revenge, exactly.”

“Setting an example?”

“Maybe.”

_Bullshit, it's totally revenge._

Seeing it again, as an adult, watching Taren apologize for his own trauma, had his blood boiling all over again.

“Would you like to set an example here?”

“Here?”

“Yes, here.” Kylo nodded toward the wall that separated them from the first cell Poe had been taken to.

 

He grasped what was being proposed. He felt his heart swell in his chest, his arteries sing with iron and oxygen.

But murdering the guards that had _taken advantage_ of him wouldn't liberate any planets, wouldn't bring the Order down from the inside, wouldn't do anything but satisfy his own irresponsible bloodlust. Just the thought was doing something for him. His body felt warmer and stronger than it had since he'd been taken, almost whole again. 

    _What are you doing to me?_

Poe didn't really believe, in his heart, in the Dark side. He believed in the Force, and that some people used it to evil ends. But any tool in the wrong hands could be put to evil use. It was useful to talk about Light and Dark, but he had a hard time believing that the Force itself was something binary. He wouldn't have sworn to this belief, but it was generally how he saw it.

What was happening now - this sense of strength flowing through him, almost like he could flex his arms and rip them out of the restraints - was clearly an illusion. Ben wanted him to believe, not just that Dark side was real, but that it was in him and was good for him. He wasn't going to fall for it, no matter how good it felt.  

 

But the underlying desire - _an orgy of castration and decapitation_ \- was absolutely real. 

His lips pulled back, tugging at the stinging wounds, as he met Ben's eyes. 

"What do you want from me," he rasped.

“Show me how you meditate, and I will show you the power of the Dark side.”

Poe's kneejerk response - _What're you saying, you wanna, like, rule the galaxy together or something?_ \- flitted across his mind and came nowhere near his mouth. This was the second time Ben had asked. Apparently, he meant it.

 

 

 


	8. Ben

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The first of Poe's labors.

* * *

 

All the red flags were raised. Alarms were going off, barely audible under the bloodlust singing in his veins.

He shook his head, tried to make his mouth say _No._

But Ben's words seemed to offer the prospect of survival, like he might be _the right person_ that Lando had told him years ago to look for. The thought was almost as seductive as the illusion of strength coursing through his body, making him desperate to _Get out Let me out_ , when just hours ago he'd been resigned, even eager for death to come and come soon.

He tried to get back to that dutiful, sacrificial attitude, to tell himself it had to be a trap, not to cooperate with anything being asked of him. But it was hard to care when it all seemed so small and far away, like the galactic war in the making was just a game, just an elaborate dejarik set that wasn't worth his one and only life.

The best he could do was to consider Ben's motives with objective curiosity. He knew, for example, that plenty of powerful people got off on being brought down. Ben wasn't interested in _getting off_ , or so he said, but of course there was more to it than that, sometimes. Those powerful people - senators, tycoons; dark lords, maybe? - some of them needed dommes in their lives because they were so arrogant in their own power and so immersed in their corrupt spheres that there was no one left around them to admire. And admiration, in Poe's opinion, was a profound psychic need. From what he'd seen, it was likely vacant in Ben's life. He bookmarked the latter thought.

Or maybe it was just about him; maybe Ben wanted to learn how to manipulate him better. Not that he needed to; he'd already shown he could take anything he wanted.

Or perhaps to manipulate other people? To use Poe as the key to a cipher, to find a route to that rare and tenuous hall-of-mirrors space where obedience was bold and transgressive, and resistance was a form of weakness. In order to exploit it for demagogic purposes, maybe, or to get his hooks into some of those decadent senators.

But the simplest answer was the most likely one: that Kylo had seen some unfamiliar joy in his thoughts, and wished to possess it for himself.

 

Not that anything seemed likely to ever be joyful again. 

The thing was, Poe realized, what he had done was kind of fucked up. He'd used his sexuality as a shield; against pain, against fear, against everything in this cold, dead, unsentimental place. If he'd had the slightest confidence in his own survival, he might have used a different tactic, gone to a different happy place.

[He'd figured out a long time ago that, for him at least, that thing that people called subspace was not entirely different than other kinds of dissociated states. He had a pretty good theoretical understanding of the latter: people dissociated in response to uncounterable threats, untreatable pain, utter helplessness. His training had been about anticipating and controlling that response. His private life had, often, been about seeking out helplessness on his own terms.]

He could already feel regret tearing at him, like he'd given up too much of himself without even realizing he was doing it. It felt dirty. It was going to fucking whallop him if he ever actually sat down to think about it.

At any rate, he was pretty sure he wasn't the one to be teaching anyone about _protecting themselves_. And he shouldn't be teaching Ben _anything_ , regardless how esoteric it seemed. Ben clearly had some kind of goal in mind. Just because he couldn't imagine the consequences of the proposed exchange, didn't mean there wouldn't be any.

"You're afraid I'm going to hurt your friends."

"Of course I am."

"Hm."

"And, you know, the rest of the galaxy. Not just the ones who were my friends."

"Still married to the cause, then."

Poe shook his head.

"I may be dead to them. I may not live to fight again. But I'm still on their side."

Ben looked  _hurt_. 

_Stow that bullshit._

Ben closed his eyes, clenched his jaw. And then - 

Dropped to one knee, one hand on his saber, one fist on his knee, in what Poe recognized as some ancient gesture of fealty.

_No no no wait no_

What did Ben think he was going to get out of this? Would it make him stronger? And against whom? The free and peace-loving people of the galaxy? Against the First Order, which he clearly despised? Against their mutual Master, or in service of him?

    **Only in the service of my own freedom.**

Poe just had time to think, 

 _Freedom?? You'll take me with you when you go, right?_  

before the restraints were falling away.

 

He stared at them, almost wishing them shut again. Almost. He stretched slowly, experimentally. It lit up every joint with the grey fire of pins and needles. Within a minute his fingers were throbbing with the return of blood. He eased himself down to the floor on weak knees and ankles. 

Ben didn't move.

Poe took a few weak steps. He hobbled to the nearest wall and leaned against it. He started to slide down it and caught himself just in time; he rolled away just before his ass hit the floor. 

    _Shit._

He hadn't actually said yes, had he? He hadn't agreed to this yet. Maybe he would have, with more time to think it over. In fact he probably would have. But he hadn't, yet; he needed more time to think it through.

And, he realized, Ben could probably hear everything he was thinking. Which kind of undermined whatever  _authority_   he was supposed to have in this situation. Which, again, he had not agreed to.

"Do you even know the  _meaning_  of consent?"

"The most stable form of allegiance. Not as valuable as an alliance, nor as volatile. Not as liable as outright surrender."

_You are fucking ill._

He staggered back to his feet, addressing Kylo from the side, like a drill instructor.

"I'm not talking about planets! Or factions! I'm talking about _people._ About _me._ "

He paced slowly around the cell, letting circulation return.

"You will NOT enter my mind again without my express permission, understand?"

He half expected to be thrown against a wall for his impudence, but the knight just answered, "Understood, Master."

A fresh headache erupted at that. He'd said he wasn't interested in sex. What the hell was he doing watching cheezy S/M porn, or wherever he'd picked that up?

"Why did you call me that?"

"I am your student."

Right, Poe sighed. The guy had probably called every teacher he'd ever had  _Master_.

"Well, I'd rather you didn't. I'm not into, formalities."

"As you wish," There was a distinct empty space at the end of the sentence.

"Right. So. No more going into my head," he glared.

Ben nodded.

"And yeah I know, I dream loud, I probably think loud, too. Can you, like, block it out or something? They teach you to do that?"

"I will."

"And don't speak  _into_  my head, either." Compunction forced him to reluctantly grit out, "Unless it's, like, an emergency or something. Understand?"

"I understand."

He paused to rest his forehead against the cool metal wall for a moment.

 

... 

  
The only way he could imagine approaching this was academically. He pictured himself as the alternate-timeline forty-plus instructor.

"Look at me." He nodded at the stool Ben had occupied earlier. "Have a seat."

_Today, we're going to talk about altered states of consciousness._

He allowed himself another lap around the cell.

"When sentient beings experience an existential threat, our minds and bodies react to protect ourselves from that threat," he addressed the small classroom in his mind.

"You're familiar with the adrenal response." At least, the soldiers in his mind were. "Commonly known as _fight or flight_. When all hope of either is exhausted, the mind often finds a refuge of last resort within itself."

He was practically reading out of a manual. He could do this.

"For example, soldiers," _like yourselves,_ "sometimes experience religious ecstasies on the battlefield, in their last moments, or moments they believe to be their last. Feeling the Force for the first time, or meeting one's ancestral gods."

Ben squinted at him suspiciously. Poe didn't know it, but he was thinking of the rumors surrounding Vader's death.

 

"It's not just threats to the body that can trigger this response. The psyche, a sentient's core understanding of itself, also reacts to existential threats. In response to the loss, or imminent loss, of things like agency or identity."

He heard Ben inhale sharply, and pretended not to notice.

_Interesting._

"For example, prisoners held in solitary confinement. Sometimes experience delusions or even hallucinations."

He finally allowed himself to look at Ben again. Ben's face was softer. He felt a tickle run through him that felt like pleading.

"Does that sound like... anything you've experienced?"

Ben shut down immediately, his face hardening, his touch receding.

Poe took that as a _yes_ , and placed another bookmark. Pressing on directly would just shut Ben down even more. He needed to circle around, find another, less sensitive angle.

 

"When -"

_I? We? One? People?_

_Submit? Surrender? Do? Experience?_

Ben had called it _meditation_.

 

"When we practice this kind of meditation ...

"What we are doing is ..."

_Imagining? Pretending? Simulating?_

"... simulating that kind of threat. How we choose to simulate it, tends to be unique to the individual. For example ..."

He tried to think of an example far from Ben's apparent soft spot. It wasn't hard. He remembered, treasured, every time he'd come to under Rold's care with bacta strips tightening across his back.

"... some people use physical pain as a stimulus."

 

Ben's eyes actually lit up a little at that.

"Great power comes from the mastery of pain."

That wasn't quite the way Poe would have put it, but it was something.

"Right... you know, that's actually not too far off base. You kind of understand. But, here's the thing: I'm not going to hurt you. Physically. I don't know you well enough. And... honestly, I'm afraid of you. What you might do to me if I hurt you."

Ben smirked at him a little, and then waved his hand dismissively. 

"I don't think that's what you want from me anyway. But the larger point is: I can't promise you anything. I can't, just,  _make_  you feel something you don't - that you've never felt before. You have to want to go there."

"You describe all forms of meditation."

Poe knew fuck-all about that, but it sounded like it was probably true. The one thing he knew for sure was that this conversation should be a  _lot_ longer. But he was afraid of losing Ben if he kept talking, and losing Ben would be losing his only chance of dying somewhere that wasn't a godsdamned Star Destroyer.

 

"Okay, then. Is this really what you want?"

"Yes," and the space was back again.

Poe took a long, deep breath.

"Stand up."

Ben did. Poe stood in front of him. Fuck, he was tall.

"Kneel. Like before."

Ben took his knee again in the old-fashioned formal posture. Poe had meant it when he'd said he wasn't one for formalities, but he was intrigued by the one-hand-on-the-saber bit. He held out his hand experimentally, and tried not to act shocked when Ben handed it to him. He clipped it to his belt before he could drop it in his amazement and turned away.

 

He paced while he tried to straighten his thoughts, tried to get into the right headspace.

_Ok. You're in charge, here. Stay calm._

The thing with the weapon - it didn't mean anything. It's not like he could _use_ it. Ben could rip it out of his hand from across the room with just a thought. It was symbolic, ritualistic. But still, _damn_.

  
And what did he have to work with, here? What ingredients were going into this mess? He pulled up his bookmarks:

_I saw how you protected yourself._

_How you healed yourself._

_You needn't be alone._

_Admiration. Agency. Identity. Freedom._

Pretty big stuff. But also, pretty vague stuff.

 

He thought about his voice. He could pull off a reasonable dom voice, with the right person. He didn't think he could do it here. He felt good about his teaching voice, though. He didn't do the hokey, twangy grizzled-vet persona when he taught. His teaching voice was actually very gentle, and people listened.

 

He took a nice, slow breath, and approached Ben, from the side again.

"I want both knees on the ground."

He complied.

"Thank you. Now face me."

Poe dropped on one knee to his level, so focused in the moment that he didn't even notice how they mirrored their first encounter on Jakku.

 

"What happened, Ben? How did you get here?" His voice was gentle, but his eyes were cool and steady on Ben's.

"I know your family. I know your community. I know you were every bit as loved as I was. How is it that you're so alone, now?"

Ben turned away, eyes low. Poe felt the gears clicking into place.

"Tell me about love, Ben. You just told me, that's why you're here. Because you didn't think the Light would allow love in your life. So here you are. Who is it that you love? Tell me about them."

Even after what had been done to him, this kind of cruelty didn't come easily. And this wasn't his favorite role under the best of circumstances, with a  _healthy_   partner. This? Tearing  _Kylo Ren_  apart? He couldn't have imagined anything more odious, but here he was, and it was clicking; it was gonna fly, he had this.

"You can talk to me. I know how it is. It feels so _good_ to love someone. To be loved. It's so beautiful... so powerful."

He saw anger flash across the knight's face.

"And to trust. It feels so good to trust. To be safe. Right, Ben? No armor, no weapon can compete with trust."

Ben's eyes flicked up at Poe from the floor and back again. The scowl on his face said _back the fuck off_ , but if he thought Poe was going to go easy on him just because he could strangle him with a thought, he hadn't been paying attention.

 

"Surely there's someone in this galaxy you trust, Ben."

The knight winced again and Poe realized it wasn't just his innocently cruel words, but the name itself that stung. He made his move, laying one palm across a collarbone and grasping a fistful of hair with the other.

He whispered harshly, "I don't care what your new friends in the First Order call you. When you're with me, your name is Ben. Do you understand?"

"I understand."

"Good," Poe said, gentle again, sliding his hand to the base of Ben's throat.

"Now tell me about your friends. Big war machine like this? Full of generals and admirals? I'm sure plenty of people here would love," he squeezed gently, "to give you what you need. So tell me. Is there no one here you trust? Or just no one that you like?"

Ben glared, hurt, knowing that Poe knew the answer was neither.

"What about your _knights_ , then? So mysterious, so powerful, such a  _secret_. Surely... you trust one another with your lives?"

Poe's hand slid yet higher, squeezing a little more. Ben closed his eyes, realizing he was defeated. He kept his promise to stay away from Poe's thoughts, but couldn't resist a little taste of his mood, expecting to be stung by vicious gloating.

Instead he tasted sadness and irony and something like a reflection of himself _._ He saw that Poe had been truly reluctant _;_  but now that he was here, he was really, fully here, and reading him with all the alacrity a force-mute could muster. Taking no pleasure from it, doing it only for Ben, because it was what he needed. Most people, in his position, would have recognized the feeling as gratitude.

 

"So. That leaves only your Master. That's what you call him, right? The Supreme Leader? Your _Master_?"

Ben shivered, felt pinpricks at his eyes.

"Of course. He's the one. The only soul in this galaxy you trust. Right? You must. After all, you've given him everything."

Ben shook his head, but the only words he could make were, "He takes."

It was a damn good thing, Poe thought, that he had a role to inhabit, lines to anticipate. If he'd been himself, he would have snapped back,  _Banthashit, don't tell me about taking; I've seen what *you* take._ Instead he fell forward, his knees on Ben's thighs, pushing him back on his haunches.

 

"Who, then? Who in all the worlds do you trust, Ben?"

The calm, steady eye contact was scaring Ben, he could see it. He felt his hand go numb, frozen, keeping him from squeezing any tighter. Poe narrowed his eyes.

"I'm not asking you who you  _can_  trust. I'm not asking who you  _ought_   to trust. I'm asking you who you  _do_   trust. It's your choice, Ben."

 

After a tense moment he felt the flesh of Ben's throat yield again under his fingertips.

"Put your hand on my wrist."

Ben did.

"Hold it. Hold my wrist. If you need me to stop, just let go. Just drop your hand and I'll stop. Try it."

Ben dropped his hand, and Poe opened his palm at once.

"Okay?"

Ben nodded. Poe curled his hand around Ben's throat again.

"We were talking about trust. How good it feels. How much you need it. That it's a choice you make."

He moved his other hand lower, to the base of Ben's skull, encircling his neck in his hands.

"It's your choice."

He felt Ben breathing. Swallowing. Breathing.

"It's your choice, Ben."

 

"I trust you," Ben whispered, "I trust you. No one else," his trust truly blind, not knowing if Poe would try to snap his neck. Not that he couldn't stop him from doing so, but such a betrayal would be devastating.

Instead Poe loosened his grip ever so slightly, closed his eyes and inhaled. When he opened his eyes again he looked... proud.

"Thank you, Ben. I know that was hard for you to say."

Ben was blindsided by the amount of pleasure the praise brought him.

"How do you feel?"

The word blossomed in Ben's mind, the thing he'd seen and envied in Poe.  _Obedient._ He hesitated a moment to savor it. It was both a thrill and a relief at once.

All his life, he'd been coerced and compelled to obey, and had done so with shades of reluctance and resentment. None of the force wielders that had controlled his life had ever inspired this feeling, and he was sure that no-one else ever would again.

It was beautiful, and it hurt, because there was nothing Poe wanted with him. Nothing he wanted from him but his freedom. If they ever met again, in the galaxy he hoped to turn upside down, everything would be different; there would never be any happiness for either of them, certainly not together.

But he had this moment, and it _did_ give him power against Snoke, because it was his; it was _theirs_. It was something Snoke would never promise and could never give.

How did he feel?

"Grateful." He looked up into Poe's eyes. "Thank you."

"Do you want me to stop?"

"Would you stop? If it were you?"

"No," Poe answered truthfully. He felt Ben swallow.

"Please."

So Poe continued, just like he would with anyone else, slowly increasing the pressure on the other man's throat, never taking his eyes off of Ben's. He watched his eyelids flutter, catching Poe's own gaze and darting away again, his face tensing and calming in waves while Poe spoke to him, gentle and confident and rewarding...

... until the waves ebbed, pulled him down into soft, warm, calm; like the place he'd seen before in Poe's mind, but his own. It was so... nice.

Ben's hand dropped involuntarily, and Poe pulled his hands away to Ben's shoulders. He felt his cheek with the back of his hand.

"I'm here. You're okay, Ben. You stay here as long as you want, okay?"

Ben was aware of Poe speaking to him and helping him down into something like a meditation posture, and it was fine that the posture wasn't quite right. In fact, it was all wrong; it was ridiculous, but it was fine, because Poe was being so good to him. His voice was soft, hushing and soothing and telling him, _where we are,_ _right here, right now, you can come here whenever you need to. I'll be here, you can always come here..._

 

* * *

 

Poe moved around, inspecting all the panels and consoles in the room, looking for one that might dispense water, trying not to speculate on the possible consequences of his actions. He finally discovered a panel that opened to a tiny fresher,  _praise the Force_. He drank and drank, and then stood absently trying to figure out how long it'd been since he'd pissed and how worried he should be about it. Eventually he just sat on the unit, not to use it but because it was more comfortable than either the floor or the rack.

He should have been scared. He didn't know what Ben's _freedom_ entailed, but it had to be better than dying here, right? He didn't know where Ben intended to go or whether he intended to keep fighting, or for what, or if he just wanted to disappear, like Poe wanted to. How long he intended to keep Poe with him - a little while? Not at all? Forever? He had no idea.

He spaced out for a few minutes, waking to a sharp pain in his back that he recognized as an abortive bowel movement. It jolted him back to where he was and what he was supposed to be doing, namely: murdering a pair of rapists and the squad that abetted them. And then, hopefully, escaping a star destroyer with the help of the Master of the Knights of Ren.

 _Now that is a fucking story_ , he thought, even managing to chuckle a little, before chuckling made him puke up some of the water he'd drunk too fast.

 

 


	9. FD-1881

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The bloodletting begins gently.

* * *

 

The first thing 1881 saw was Lord Ren, and for a few anxious seconds that was all he could see. Then he saw the prisoner, unrestrained, leaning against a wall.

"Lord Ren! Do you require assistance with the prisoner?"

"Nah," answered the rebel, "It's actually the prisoner who requires your assistance."

1881 looked between them, fingers twitching toward his blaster. The prisoner tutted and batted his hand away with some kind of - _holy shit is that a lightsaber?_

"Specifically, I need credits, to start my _new life_ ," he smiled and gestured expansively, "wherever the fuck that may be. I heard you came into some recently. Credits."

1881 flinched at that, and stuttered, "I'm sorry! I wasn't - I mean, I didn't..."

"I know; I know who you are," he said. "You're the one they sent out. I know. You shoulda heard the shit they said behind your back."

He gave 1881 a hard look, and 1881 found himself caught in the eye contact, even through the helmet.

"That's not the kinda nickname you get from your _friends_. It's why I'm giving you a second chance, here."

"Sir?" 1881 asked. He couldn't think of anything else to call the guy.

"You don't belong here any more than I do. Come with us. Away. We can stick together for a while til you get on your feet."

1881 gaped at Lord Ren inside his helmet.

"He's right, you know. You don't belong here. But escape doesn't mean safety. It doesn't mean peace. It means," Ren struggled with the distasteful word, finally gesturing to Poe and spitting out, " _hustling_ for a living in the sordid underbelly of the galaxy. And you, 1881, are a timid creature. You reek of fear. Even with a companion, I give you a week before you're enslaved, or killed, or have turned yourself back in, begging forgiveness. Which will not be granted."

1881's cheeks flushed as he realized Lord Ren was correct.

"If you wish to have a short, filthy, terrifying adventure before you die, by all means, go with him. But if you're ready now, I promise you it will be quick. The last thing you will hear will be kind words from this man."

1881 was blinking rapidly inside his helmet.

"Let's take some of that stuff off, huh buddy?" Poe stepped closer. "Lemme take that blaster off your hands."

Whatever was going on here, 1881 wasn't sure it extended to allowing his weapon to be confiscated. The guy could do that _after_ he was dead, right? He turned again to Lord Ren, who nodded and gestured toward the rebel. 

"It's okay, Eighty-one," he said, slipping the weapon into his belt, "You're not gonna get in trouble for this. Let's have that helmet, hm, let you breathe a little easier?"

1881 removed and handed over the helmet.

"Do you like this thing?"

1881 shook his head, wiping a tear away.

"Me neither," said Poe and tossed it across the room. "Can I tell you a secret?" 1881 nodded. Poe whispered in his ear, "My flight helmet looks like it's too big for me. It's not, it's supposed to be big, protect all the bullshit up here," he tapped his skull. "But I always felt like a dork in it. That's the _real_ reason I'm not going back." He smiled. His smile was really nice, and 1881 felt his lips twisting a little, too.

"You're nice," he said.

"Well, I don't have much to go on, but seems like you mighta been nice too if you hadn't landed here. Helluva lot nicer than your buddies, anyway."

"They're not my buddies."

"Oh, of course they're not," the prisoner murmured apologetically, and _hugged_ him. He asked, "Can I tell you something else?" and stepped back, and 1881 nodded.

"When I get to them, it's not gonna be quick; it's gonna hurt, and the last things they hear are not gonna be nice. So - is there anything you want me to say to them? For you?"

"No... no, I, just, I don't want to think about it."

"Okay, of course, okay." The prisoner took his hands. "You're done with them, forever. But there's something important I want to talk to you about."

"Yessir."

"What do you know about the Force?"

1881 flinched and tried not to look at Ren.

"No, no, the Force isn't just some magic Ben uses to abuse his subordinates." He squeezed the trooper's hands, held his eyes.

"The Force is in every living thing, Eighty-one. It's in me, and it's in you. It flows through and around us, and binds us together..."

Poe drew the trooper close and wrapped one arm snug around his shoulder. He kept talking softly while he kneaded the back of his neck, like he was soothing a pitten. He felt where the spine met the hollow in the base of the skull, spread his fingers out on the lobes on either side, pressing his middle finger to the lateral target that would vaporize Eighty-one's consciousness in a painless instant.

 

1881 could feel the man's right arm moving; he knew that it was raising the blaster. His voice was so soothing, though; if 81 just listened and didn't try to think, he could almost feel the energy the man was talking about, an aspect of the Force that had nothing to do with choking or throwing people, but seemed to wrap around them and hold them together.

He felt the muzzle replace the man's fingertip on his skull, felt the hand withdraw to his shoulder. The man pulled back to look him in the eye, and 81 could see all of him: the stoic, handsome bravado in the face of humiliation; the silent, futile pleas that had haunted him til the narcs kicked in; the hard assessment of 81's own unhappiness; the offer that he never expected 81 to accept; the reassuring smile as he disarmed him. The traitors, he wondered, were they all like this?

"The Force is with you, Eighty-one."

 

... 

 

"You used the blaster."

"You promised him it would be quick. You saw what happened with this thing."

The first time Poe had tried the lightsaber, it had thrown him halfway across the room. It had felt heavy and wild, and it had taken all his might and concentration to struggle through a few basic katas. He suspected that it was only with Ben's assistance that he'd even gotten that far without cutting his own leg off.

"I wouldn't put a rat through that kind of a death."

"You are the most sickeningly merciful person I've ever met."

Poe shook his head. "I'm not. I don't mind the rest of them suffering. But honestly? I'll probably just embarrass myself. Can't even hold the thing still." He held the hilt out to Ben. "Thanks but, maybe this was a dumb idea."

"I promise you, you will find the power when you need it."

 


	10. FD-1151

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Our hero's descent continues.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> First course: Succotash with a side of ham.
> 
> Second course: Something small and limp in a paper bag labelled Graphic Depiction of Violence. Probably not a sandwich.

* * *

 

Poe adjusted the rack to a somewhat chair-like position and sat in it, doing his best to appear to be lounging comfortably, 1881's blaster in his lap, the lightsaber clipped to his belt. 3070, the one running the holocorder, was called in. He wilted at the sight of Ren, hardly noticing Poe until he spoke.

"Seventy, right? The director? Great to see you again. I've actually got a commission for you, a holo. Swan song kinda thing, you're gonna love it."

The trooper stared blankly.

"But first, we gotta talk numbers. I believe you owe me _royalties."_

3070 appeared frozen.

"You know, money? Credits? For my appearance in your holo?" He held his hand out and twitched his fingers in the _give it here_ motion. 3070 looked back and forth between the two men, and the blaster. When Ren remained impassive behind his mask, and Poe's stare went unbroken, he reached into a pouch and held out a credit stick.

"Great, this is from yesterday? This is a great start, thanks. As far as residuals: I know all the numbers aren't in yet, but I'm kind of in a hurry, here. I'll settle for all of it."

"All of...?"

"Your money. Where do you keep it? Hard storage? Commissary account?"

"Um. You mean. My piece account?"

"Whatever you call it. I need access to it."

"N-no," 70 said, even as his hand moved to his belt and pulled out a small reader. He swore under his breath as he handed the thing to Poe.

"Thank you. I hope you don't mind Lord Ren helping you out with this. How do I get into this? You have an access code?"

"Just, the transponder," 70 said thickly. He snapped a button off his chest and handed that to Poe, too. 

"Thank you, Seventy. This helps me out a lot. And, you know, it's not like _you're_ gonna need it."

At that, Kylo began to lift the mental fog that had been screening the room. 3070 saw the blood splatter on the wall; his eyes followed the thin trickle of blood to 1881's body, laid out in the back of the cell. He began to sweat. This - this was _fucked up._ Poe followed his gaze.

"Edgy, right? I mean, he was practically innocent. But I hear that's what the boys are into these days. Dark themes, ambiguous morals, that kinda stuff. I'm telling ya, Seventy, this is gonna be big; it's gonna blow all your previous work outta the sky. Here's why I brought you in: there's gonna be a lot of action, here; we need a deep field, and I know how tricky that is with these cheap corders. Think you can give me that?"

 "Uhkay," 3070 answered dully, and then seemed to gather his wits to answer, "Yes, sirs, okay. I've got it. I can do that."

 "Good. So: you record, I - do my thing, and Lord Ren uses the Force to keep your hands from shaking. Sound cool?"

 Poe sat back in the rack, smiling. "Hey, Seventy. It's great to be working with you again."

 

* * *

 

"Hey Ben. I need to talk to you."

_Remember how I said Don't speak into my head? I think I need to modify that. I think - I'm actually going to need help with this._

 

* * *

 

He really was lounging, now; he'd gotten the rack adjusted just right and taken Kylo's cape and cowl to cushion it. He cultivated and projected the belief that it was some kind of throne, sprawling and spreading his legs. He'd clipped the lightsaber so it hung heavy in his groin. It felt good. He reclined and ordered the next victim to enter.

1151 knew nothing good awaited him. He took one look in the cell and realized how badly they'd fucked up.

The corps was full of rumors and pet theories about Lord Ren's sexuality, or lack thereof. Whether he was celibate or not, by choice or by the Supreme Leader's command, how this related to his violent freakouts. A popular theory was that the Supreme Leader had castrated him, and the artificial baritone of his vocoder was meant to disguise this.

1151, personally, was of the belief that Ren fucked his subordinates all the time and just wiped their memories afterwards. So his reaction to the two men waiting for him in the cell was _of course._ Of course Ren would want to keep the painfully attractive prisoner for himself. And keep him well, by the looks of him, reclining arrogantly on Ren's own cloak. He saw himself, his squad, sharing the halls of the ship with a spoiled concubine, and thought,  _No, any hell but that, no._

The tantrums, he thought, bloody hell, the tantrums, any time someone looked at the guy the wrong way. 1151 looked at the prisoner's face: the red and purple bruises, the lump in his nose, the scabbed-over black slashes across his pretty lips. 1151 was a dead man - they all were. He wondered how their deaths would affect the holo they'd made. He imagined it would become  _legendary._

 

_What's he making of this?_

    **He thinks I've taken you as a consort, and that I am about to kill him.**

_Ha. For hurting me, or for damaging me?_

    **The latter, I'm afraid.**

 

"Good guess, asshole, but no. Try again."

"Are you - talking to me?"

"I said  _asshole,_  didn't I?"

"How did you - "

"Let's see if that intellectually malnourished little nut-brain of yours can figure out what's going on, here." Poe grinned so wide the scabs pulled and stung; he licked at them.

1151 wasn't used to being made fun of or being called stupid. He was usually the one doing the fun-making, usually believed he was the smartest guy in the room, if only because people let him think so. And he wasn't actually stupid - if he hadn't been indoctrinated at the tender age of 4, he might have had a decent career in the underground economy.

He watched as Poe licked at his split lips, as he sucked one lip into his mouth, as he slowly, unblinkingly, scraped his teeth over one of the wounds, let the blood stain his teeth and trickle down his chin.

"Refresh your memory?"

That's funny, he hadn't  _seemed_   like a psychopath before. Cocky, yes, once he'd found his tongue. And funny, too, in a way 51 could respect. They'd warned him about the knight, and he'd just joked about it, like he wasn't scared at all.

 _He's someone important_ , Fo had said.

_Shit._

He couldn't be an envoy; they'd picked him up in civvies in a squalid camp on a junkyard planet. If a vintage jacket from another generation's war counted as civvies.

"You're a time traveler from the Civil War," he said, deadpan.

"Nice one," the guy smiled. "Getting warmer."

Was he a spy? 1151 felt his pulse race. Shit, he had to be. 1151 watched a _lot_ of spy holos. He knew they were mostly bullshit. On two points, though, they generally concurred: spies were irresistibly attractive, and they were arrogant little shits who spat in the face of danger. Holy fuck, he had fucked  _a spy._  He suddenly regretted that he wasn't going to live to brag about this.

"You're not really with the Resistance, are you?"

"Ha ha! No. No I'm not," Poe laughed. It felt so good to say out loud, almost gleeful, like a weight had fallen off his shoulders, that it hardly even occurred to him to add _Not anymore._

"We didn't know, Sir, I swear. We never would have let any harm come to you, Sir. If we'd known."

"That's not really the point, asshole."

"Sir?"

"Ben here is gonna walk us through a little after-action review."

"Sir."

"Let's talk about what went wrong back there."

 _[Feelings_   came with the familiar words slipping from his mouth. Talking about  _what went wrong back there_   had meant keeping his pilots sober long enough to objectively review a mission and its losses.  _Lessons learned_   meant finding some real tactical insight, while avoiding the kind of blame-laying that would tear the survivors apart with resentment, or eat them alive with guilt.]

"Seventy, you probably have some input here, too."

"The fuck?" Alf spun around; he hadn't seen the other trooper, hadn't realized he was being recorded.

"So as I recall, before _this_ asshole showed up, we were making some kind of... porn? How exactly was _that_   supposed to work?"

"I was only cording from the waist up, Sir."

"I could see that. What I'm asking is why."

"We didn't want to hurt you, Sir."

He fired three quick shots, each missing 70 by inches.

"I recall something about time constraints."

"Yessir, that too, sir. Yes."

"Who was gonna watch it?"

"Anyone who would pay for it, Sir."

"Was it going to be used for propaganda?"

"Sir?"

"Dissemination. Was anyone besides other troopers going to see it?"

"No! Shit, no, I don't know what the penalties for this are like where you come from, but -"

"Penalties for what? Distributing contraband or rape?"

"I didn't -" 

Poe fired at him again.

"It looked like I was supposed to be... enjoying myself, somehow. What's that all about?"

"Well, that's what, you know."

"What."

"What people want to see."

" _Not_   prisoners being assaulted? Really?"

"N-not, uh, not most people."

Poe shot a pointed glare at 1151.

"So what the fuck was I enjoying? I mean," _I'm into some pretty heavy shit, but_ , "that stun baton ain't anybody's idea of a good time."

"The story is that, uh, FD-1881," 3070 nodded toward the body.

"I know Eighty-one. We had a nice talk."

"Uh. Well. The story is. That he was blowing you. Sir."

1151 barked out a laugh. "Why didn't you just make him do it! You know he would have!"

Poe fired past 1151's head. "Shut up, we're talking." He turned back to the other guard. "But seriously, that's bullshit."

"They don't have to believe it. They just want a story. And, it sells copies. They hear the rumor; they want to judge for themselves."

Poe had to concede that that was kinda how people worked. He'd loaded enough notoriety porn in his time, maybe a third of which had the redeeming quality of at least being a little bit hot, and much more of which left him kicking himself afterward.

"Did he know this? Eighty-one?"

"Nossir, of course not."

"What... did you think he was going to do? When he found out?"

"Get pissed? I don't know."

 

Poe closed his eyes, in exasperation at first, til he found himself blinking away tears of relief, knowing that they hadn't broadcast him across the galaxy. He took a moment to breathe, to let the relief sink in. Then he turned to Alf.

 

"And then  _you_   showed up. You fucking prick."

"We didn't know, Sir, I swear, we thought you were Resistance scum, I mean how would we -"

"Alf. It's what you did, not who you did it to."

That sounded a lot like something  _resistance scum_   would say, and he suddenly felt very exposed.

"Let's, fucking, get this thing in the air. Ben?"

 

Ben probed Alf's memory, just as he'd done to Poe. Poe received only  a trace of it; he was still here in the cell, in the present, but he could kind of dimly see what Alf was experiencing. He saw himself, crouched and manacled, felt the clicks as Alf's thumbs unlatched the groin plate of his armor.

He raised the blaster.

"Do it."

And 1151 did it, dropped the piece to the floor.

"You should know, you'll bleed out faster if you actually get turned on by this. Hands up, trooper. Like this - y'know, stick-em-up."

1151 complied.

He could dimly see Fo kneeling behind him, but Alf's attention was all on his face, flex-armored thumb at the corner of his clamped lips, fingers clawing, thumb twisting, tearing ...

_*Blam!*_

He fired, blowing the thumb clean off.

An index finger followed, prying his lips apart, he was bleeding already.

_*Blam!*_

Middle fingers, hooked behind his molars, tugging while he grit with all his strength. A knee to the chin jostled him enough to get between his jaws.

_*Blam! * Blam! * Blam!*_

Finger, finger, knee.

1151 yelped and fell, all his weight on the intact knee. He was groaning. He should have been fucking screaming.

 

Six flex-armored fingers, pink with his blood, jacking his mouth open.

_*Blam! * Blam! * Blam! * Blam!*_

Open -

 

He'd been steady up to this moment, but now he was sweating, blood pounding. He jumped out of the rack and closed on 1151.

"Take it off! That fucking helmet, take it off!"

1151 had one thumb and two pinkies left, and he scraped uselessly at the helmet. Poe tried to wrest it off himself; it wouldn't go, because there was some latch, or maybe just because he was flipping out and uncoordinated. 1151 managed to snap the latch with a pinky and Poe stumbled backward, dropping the helmet.

 

1151 glared at Poe through narrow eyes. Showing anyone who could see that he was pissed, not scared. So much like Poe's own comportment,  _yesterday_.

Maybe this guy was faking it, too. He had to be. That, or he was on some high-test stims.

Poe tried, without much dedication, to shove the blaster muzzle into Alf's mouth. He managed to draw a bit of blood, not nearly as much as he'd lost, before the trooper jerked his head away. He saw himself, for a second, battering Alf's mouth until his teeth were shattered and the blaster was deep in his gullet. But before he could do that, something else took over, and he was grabbing the guard's head and shoving it into his crotch. He was shoving, and grinding, and pounding himself against his assailant's face. 

It felt So. Fucking. Good.

For like a minute.

Then he panicked. He pushed himself away, panting.

_Oh fuck, Ben, I'm sorry. I don't know what that was. I don't know - I'm sorry._

 

He found himself standing half behind the rack and breathing way too fast. Needing the weight of the thing between himself and the defiant trooper. He didn't remember holstering the blaster. He was clutching the lightsaber hilt in front of his crotch, like it could protect him somehow.

Why was he so afraid? Ben was on his side, Alf was mutilated and kneeling and not long for this world. He had a  _lightsaber._  And blasters. And he was still afraid.

_The guard could still tackle him, shove one bloody stump of a hand into his mouth, two fingers to tear at his trousers..._

_Breathe. Slower._

His hands ached to light the weapon. He needed it. Craved it.

He stepped back out in the open. Stepped toward the guard, staying out of arm's reach. Nearly panicked again as he lifted the weapon, exposing himself.

"Do you know what this is? Yeah you do. This is how you're going to die, Alf."

His voice sounded horribly high and trembly, not at all dark and threatening.

"The boys are gonna love it. It'll be a cool holo. I mean, I hope it will. I'm not very good with it. Hell, I can't even use the Force."

"Being a little ----- probably doesn't help, either," Alf sneered.

Poe elided the ugly comment, knowing on some level the guy was trying to provoke him into killing him quickly. He nodded at the burn marks on the walls from his fumbling practice and looked back at Alf, allowing a hateful grin to spread across his face.

"This might take a while."

The plasma leapt forward. It shook and bounced in his hand, but it didn't throw him. If anything, the low vibrations soothed the shaking in his own hands.

 

    **Do you feel it?**   

_I feel. Things._

    **You're afraid of him.**

_I am. I know it's irrational, but. I really am._

    **And the lightsaber?**

_It feels good, better than before, it's ... wait._

    **Find your anger. I've seen it. It's powerful.**

_Are you saying ... all that stuff from Jedi lore? That stuff Master Yoda said?_

    **I told you. It would be there when you needed it. Now find your anger and take the power that it gives you.**

But everything was out of control, he couldn't feel anything besides fear.

    **Let me show you, then.**

And then, before he could agree, he was there in that meadow again, with Taren's thousand-yard stare and his own impotent rage _._ Blood was in his eyes again. They had this coming. And he would be the one do it, to bring justice to these bastards. The weapon was light and steady in his hands.

    _I can do this._

    **Do you want him to suffer?**

    _I don't care. I've got this._

    **FD-1881 suffered. Surely there were more.**

"Were there?" he snarled, forgetting that Alf hadn't heard any of that. "How many? Besides Eighty-one, how many others were there?"

"Eighty-one? That ------? You know he woulda fucked you too if he wasn't such a little -----."

Every time he hadn't punched someone in the face when he should have rushed into his head at once. Fear, anger, hate. The saber was light as a feather.

 

That didn't mean he could actually aim it. 1151's armor was scored with glancing misses before he finally hit flesh. The guard's scream was like music to his ears, and watching him finally react, trying helplessly to shield himself, was a relief. He was human, after all, mortal, and he was about to die.

When he first made contact with his target, it was just a sideswipe. 1151's limp penis wiggled away from the plasma, burned but intact, on a puff of steam. But the next blow struck home, severing the thing and slashing across the guard's pelvis and abdomen, flesh too soft and wet for any cauterization to hold. Blood and fluids poured out. Alf collapsed, screaming, curled up and clutching himself.

Poe stood over him. His mouth was locked open in his screams, even after his breath had failed and he was just convulsing silently. Poe could  _feel_   the toe of his boot shoving into the man's mouth, feel it pressing in and down, dislocating and splintering the jawbone, blood and drool pooling around his boot. He could feel it. But. He was so tired. So tired, so gone.

So he left 1151 there bleeding out, and stumbled to the corner next to Ben and collapsed.

 


	11. The Proselyte

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Our hero is tempted.

 

* * *

 

He awoke in Ben's lap, knowing that he was a bad, bad, bad, bad person. But for the first time in recent memory, he didn't feel _sorry_ for anything.

Ben shifted and helped him up to sit, beside him.

"How did it feel?"

"To kill that asshole? I don't know. Good. Bad. I don't know."

"I mean, to wield the Force."

"Tsh. That's not even funny, man."

"It wasn't meant to be."

"You don't know what it's like, Ben, knowing there's this whole thing out there that people like _you_ can see that the rest of us can't. I mean ..." he shook his head. "It's just, nothing to tease about."

"You said yourself, to FD-1881. The Force is in every living thing."

"But we can't _use_ it, the rest of us. Maybe it uses me sometimes. I'd like to think so."

Ben snorted. "For what? You think the Force is interested in your affairs? If that's what you want to believe, find yourself a deity to believe in. The only intention the Force has is to find balance in itself."

That ... sounded like it was true.

"The Force is _ours_ to use, like any resource."

"No," Poe shook his head. "Don't do this."

"You felt it, Poe. I was there. You held it in your hands; you felt it!"

"I  _felt_ you helping me."

"I helped you to find the source of your power. But the power is yours."

"Gods, Ben, don't do this."

"Of course some of us are strong in the Force. Dangerously so. But the Force is in every being, every worm and beetle, every leaf and awn. Your privilege as a sentient is to _know_ it. That knowledge is as incomprehensible to the beetle as my power is to you. I see things, know things, do things that you understand as well as a beetle understands a landspeeder. But the Force moves in you, and you move in it."

Poe just shook his head. He tried to let the words wash over him and not lodge anywhere.

"Half the sentients in the galaxy don't even believe it exits. Most of those that do, think it's something like _luck_. Those like you, that truly believe in it, have been taught for generations that you have no power to use it."

 _Unfair,_ it seemed, when Ben put it like that.

"The Light? My mother, my uncle? They don't want to liberate you. They want you to worship them. If they had their way, the whole galaxy would live like those brain-dead wretches in Tuanul. You saw them. Hollow, mindless shells."

He remembered rehearsing the slow gait and serene greetings.

"They prefer to live like the beetles, rather than as sentients. And if y-" He clenched his jaw. "If _my. mother._ has her way, the whole galaxy will crawl like blind damned beetles at her feet."

It was true - wasn't that what he himself had dreamed of just hours ago? Crawling at her feet?

"There were survivors, Poe. A handful. And what do you think they did? Do you think they mourned the dead? Do you think they wept and sang and told stories?"

_No?_

"No. They removed the bodies like any other litter and returned to their meditation. To their _worship_."

Poe could see it, the survivors dragging the bodies to unmarked graves in the shifting dunes, dry-eyed and efficient. He shivered and curled into Ben's shoulder.

"It is cold in the Light," Ben agreed. He wrapped his arms and legs around Poe, and floated his cloak over to wrap him in.

It was cold in the Light. But it was warm here. There were things, buzzing around in his head, things he needed to examine, but he couldn't catch them and they wouldn't land.

Maybe later, after some more sleep, he could catch them. Using the Dark side was stunningly exhausting. Like, he usually slept well after a good fight, sure. But this felt like a deficit he could never recover, like maybe he would have to die a little sooner to make up for it.

...

[One of the things flitting out of his grasp was that no one had actually ever lied to him about the Force. From his earliest flight lessons, his mother had told him that the Force was with him, to trust his feelings. His dad had said the same, teaching him to swim.

Curled up on the couch, watching the _Restoration_ trilogy, they'd explained that some people, (like Ben's family, but it didn't always run in families), some people were just especially strong with the Force. It really wasn't factually any different than what Ben had said with his beetle analogy. But Ben had made him feel cheated, lied to, unfairly blinded to the beauty of the universe and the power of the Force.

Another buzzing thing was that the Light wasn't the cold, heartless place Ben said it was. Everyone he'd ever loved, and everyone who'd ever loved him, were devoted, on some level, to the Light; even those who didn't really _believe_ in the Force still knew which side they were on. Their love was absolutely real, and that love was the warmest place in the galaxy. If he was cold now, it was because he was without it, and he was without it because that's where Ben wanted him to be.

And Leia. If anything she downplayed the extent of her power in the Force. It worried her when people admired her too much. The only person allowed to _worship_ her was her husband. Ben's father. And he'd run off years ago.

The suggestion that she didn't believe in mourning, coming from the one person in the galaxy whom she'd mourned as much as all of Alderaan, was beyond absurd. Poe knew far too well that she did indeed sing and weep and tell stories to remember the dead. He knew because they'd done it together too many times.]

 

* * *

 

Leia had felt his distress, when he'd confronted 1151. A spike of fear, much sharper than the others she'd been feeling, something like terror. She'd excused herself to her quarters, worrying as _hate_ jabbed into the spot in her heart that belonged to Poe. She sank into meditation, burrowed in and looked for him, but he was so far away, so indistinct, she couldn't see what was happening with him, just that it was dark and frightening.

She'd centered, found herself, found her love and her strength. Once sure in it, she'd sent it all out to him: love, strength, courage, confidence. It had been hours, now. All she could tell from this distance was that he was alive and that one crisis, at least, had passed. She couldn't make out anything else.

She had no way of knowing that he was, at the same moment, curled in her son's lap, asleep, half-convinced that she'd lied to him and used him and had never really cared about him at all.

 

 

 


	12. Of Course You Are

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> If he thought he was crashing now, the comedown he had to look forward to was going to be brutal. But he was ready to go through anything to know what the truth was, again. To be free again.

* * *

 

It was different, when he woke up. The sunset behind him, the blood around him, the weapon, or the image of it, before him: they'd all melded together at the seams, a veil of red obscuring his perception, if not his physical vision.

He knew it wasn't right. There were pieces still missing, buzzing around inside. But the need to get away, out of this sterile, grey steel prison, was powerful. He needed to be alive and warm and free again. If only the Dark side could offer that? He could face what that meant, exactly, on its own, after they were off this godsforsaken ship.

 

And he was tired, too. He just wanted to blast the remaining guards without further conversation, but he knew there were still questions he would regret not asking. He just had to figure out what they were. At any rate, there was none of the smug playfulness that he'd used before to mask his fear. He wasn't afraid of them, 4144 and 3070. He was afraid of something, but it wasn't them. 

 

He didn't have a plan; he trusted in his instincts. Fortunately, 4144 was not remotely defiant, and not at all bright. He was a walking illustration of weak-mindedness. It was no wonder he'd caved to 1151 so easily.

He tried not to hurt 44 too badly as he stripped the armor away with increasingly confident strokes of plasma. He did his best to aim carefully and leave a minimum of visibly wounded flesh, in a parody of the way he'd been treated with the stun baton. But there was no one else there to hold Fo up when he fell to his knees begging, then to all fours, and curled in on himself whimpering.

Poe was going to miss the weapon. He recoiled from using the word  _lightsaber_ in his head; it sounded embarrassingly hubristic, something he didn't deserve. If he could have a few years of practice with it, he might be able to sling it with _half_ the accuracy of a blaster.

Fo was curled up, his underalls in tatters, his back exposed. Perfect, really. Like he was asking for it. Poe ripped the remaining shreds of black away. He tapped lightly at the spots Fo had found on his own body, the ones that had made an erotic marionette of him. He made an effort to keep the wounds superficial, proud of the control he had over the weapon, and a little surprised, too; he didn't feel fear, or rage, or much of anything toward the trooper.

He looked at the wet burns from the saber, parallel streaks across the trooper's back, and smiled, delighted. He hadn't even planned this; instinct must have guided him. They looked like his own scars. In their placement, at least, although they were thick and graceless, unlike his own.

"When you were -"

_Nope, start over._

"Before. You saw the scars. On my back. What did you make of them?"

"Sir?"

"You heard me."

"Permission to speak freely, Sir?," the trooper gasped.

"Course. That's why I asked."

"Sir," he whined.

"Mm-hmm."

"I thought you might have been a slave, Sir."

"Mmm," Poe nodded, unsurprised. "And what does that mean, to you? Did you see an object, rather than a sentient being? Did you think you had a right to do what you did?"

"I, don't know, Sir," 44 moaned.

"You don't know what you thought?"

"I don't know what you're asking!"

"What thoughts," Poe enunciated, slow and patronizing, "Were in your brain. When you looked at my body. And saw a slave."

"We - we thought you were with the traitors, Sir." The words came out as an agonized groan. "My apologies, Sir."

Poe took a deep and frustrated breath. All the more frustrated because he was sure 44 wasn't playing dumb. He just _was_ dumb.

"I tell ya what, Fo. I'm sure the traitor scum are hypocritical in _all kinds_ of ways, but you don't really think they keep slaves, do you?"

"No Sir," the trooper gasped. "They're known to take contraband into their ranks, Sir!"

 

...

 

One of the buzzing things landed.

 

And then like birds lighting in a fresh mown field, more landed.

 

He turned to look at Ben, and saw him again like he had the first time. _Kylo Ren_. In his monastically ratty black kit, steel and leather obscuring his face.

 

Had he been lying, or did he believe his own rancor shit about the Light being the real evil?

 

Did it matter?

 

...

 

"They do, don't they," he said, almost to himself. "That's true. They take all kinds into their ranks. You know what, Fo? That's why they're going to win. Someday."

"Undoubtably, Sir!"

Fo's voice was a strangled, anguished groan. He really was in pain. So Poe put him out of his misery.

 

He looked up again at Ben, not hiding the bitterness on his face. Fo had inadvertently spoken a truth he'd needed to hear. But who would be there next time?

 

 

* * *

 

3070 was still catatonic under the shelf onto which the holocorder had been levitated hours ago. Poe turned to him wearily.

_Why did I have to leave you? Godsfuckingdammit._

Right, he'd left him because he had only _watched_ , before, so Poe had made him _watch_ , now. And he was going to have him unlock the holo - _this_ one - so it could be distributed. But it didn't really matter anymore. Not now that he knew the original wouldn't go far.

Not now that _this_ had gotten so far out of his control.

 _This_ was supposed to be a response, _this_ was supposed to be a cautionary example. But instead it had recorded his own sins. That brief, psychotic moment when he'd enjoyed assaulting 1151. Him curling close with the knight. Ben's proselytizing sermon, and him believing it. There was nothing there that would do anyone any good to see.

He swung the saber through the unit, sending a shower of sparks and shrapnel over 3070. The trooper gasped as he realized that this bloodthirsty madman, this apparent _friend of Lord Ren_ had just destroyed the only thing keeping him alive.

"No! No, no!"

"Yeah. I broke your toy."

"I can fix it! Or, I mean, recover the data, maybe! Put it on a new machine, good as new, I can salvage it, it'll just take some time, okay?"

"It wasn't an accident, Seventy. You wanna take your helmet off or leave it on?"

"Why! No, fuck, why? All I did was hold the corder! I didn't even _want_ them to hurt you!"

"Really? 'cause I was there, and I didn't hear you say that."

"You're not really gonna _kill_ me for that? Don't you poeple believe in fairness? How is this fair?"

"Weren't you listening? I'm not actually one of those people."

"Of course you are!"

Poe stared at him.

"Why do you say that?"

"Because you _are_ , it's obvious. _You are_."

 

Poe felt something nauseating open up somewhere down in his guts. He felt the weapon flare light, almost buoyant in his hand and - 

    _Oh. There it is._

That's where all the hate had been hiding. That's why the blade had been so steady in his hand.

 

"What else is obvious to you, Seventy?" 

He could hear the low, deadly hatred in his voice. 

"What else do you think you know about me?"

 

He could still hear, still feel, 70's voice, giving him orders, unlocking him, praising him when his body cooperated.

His _body,_ he tried to remind himself. Spasming against his will. He hadn't cooperated with anything.

But still. For a second. He'd wanted to.

 

Had 70 seen that? Seen _willing, wanting_ flicker across his face before he crushed it? Had 70 fucking smelled him coming, thought he had him pegged, thought maybe he wouldn't fight back? And if 70 had seen that, who else had?

He suddenly felt like he might have been walking around his whole life with a sign on his back that said it was okay to abuse him. Like every orgasm in his life might have been a lie, every relationship a pile of lies. Like none of his partners had ever been worthy of his trust, even the ones he thought had loved him. Not to mention the _friends_ that let it happen.

He shook his head violently to pull himself out of the spiral.

    _You know what this is, buddy. Don't believe this._

He knew mission drop when he felt it, the repeated adrenaline spikes and minimal sleep leading to paranoia. Couldn't count the number of times he'd sat through debrief obsessively smoothing his hair and straightening his clothes and checking them for stray snot, as if that would explain why everyone seemed to be staring at him.

And if this particular paranoia was especially devastating, it was just in proportion to what he'd been through.

Not stress. Trauma _._

But reason and experience were pale flames against the utter blackness, the existential horror carving him out. _Not a single person he'd ever loved had loved him back; they'd done nothing but use and take and hurt and laugh behind his back because he liked it_. He felt like turning the saber on himself, stabbing into his filthy cumstained guts and slicing right up through his stupid whore throat. If the blade had been shorter he well might have.

 

He thought about his own death  _a lot_. Usually it brought him calm and courage. This was different. He cut the plasma, afraid he was really going to hurt himself with it. 

    _C'mon buddy, finish the job and then you can freak out all you want._  

If he dropped at all, it usually didn't hit til his feet were on the ground. But sometimes the light at the end of the tunnel was enough, and that was almost certainly what was happening now. He had to finish 70 off and get this over with. Had to finish this, and then. Then.

Then what, he could let Ben comfort him again? Soothe him with a blanket of lies?

    _Yes._

_No._

_No._

He wouldn't be able to hold out forever. Hell, he hadn't even been able to hold out a few hours. He may not have considered himself part of the Resistance anymore, but he'd be damned if he'd be turned against them. He really would slash his guts out, if that was the alternative.

 

He turned around again.

"What happens after this?" His voice was weak. "How are we getting out of here? Where are we going?"

"Not we."

Poe's heart stopped.

_He wouldn't._

Wouldn't fucking leave him here, after all of this. After all they'd _shared_. Panic began to wind itself up.

"You," Ben clarified, with a tiny nod in Poe's direction.

_Me?_

"Me?"

Poe cocked his head incredulously.

"There is an aspiring deserter aboard. He saw you earlier; he is praying you are still alive. He has already bribed a detention trooper to trade assignments with him. He will be here for you in about three hours."

There were a lot of things that would have been reasonable for him to feel, in that moment. Joy. Relief. Suspicion. But Poe felt numb. The facts of his universe had rearranged themselves one too many times, and he didn't know what to believe anymore.

 

"What about - your freedom? I thought that's what ..." he gestured helplessly around at the abattoir in which they stood, at the floor between them where Ben had knelt and submitted so gratefully.

"It's going to be ... complicated. It's going to take time."

He could hear something like amusement in Ben's voice. Of course it was going to be complicated. How ignorant did he have to be to think otherwise. _Idiot._

"And you're just gonna, let me ..."

"I know how much I owe you."

Poe didn't know if it could ever compare to what he'd _lost_ , but he wasn't going to argue; he had to keep his eyes on the prize. _Out o_ _ut out out_

"Okay," he nodded. "Will I see you again?"

"I don't know."

"Okay."

He couldn't think of anything else to say.

 

Poe turned back to 70, on his own, now. Kriff, if he thought he was crashing now, the comedown he had to look forward to was going to be brutal. But he was ready to go through _anything_ to know what the truth was, again. To be free again.

At least the shock had pulled him back a bit from the very brink, if not entirely out of the deadly spiral of paranoid thinking. The doubt and self-loathing ebbed, but still clung about him a bit, and Ben's news dovetailed with it uncannily. Minutes ago he'd been afraid of Ben's plans for him; now he felt perversely rejected, almost bereft. Ben had seen everything. He'd _taken_ everything, and now he was leaving, too. Leaving Poe alone. Really alone. He had been lonely at times; who hasn't. Misunderstood, alienated, sometimes by what seemed to be his own design. But he'd never been literally _alone_ in the galaxy. Without family, friends or allies.

But then, he supposed, he wouldn't be. He'd have this _deserter_. For a while, at least. He could only picture Eighty-one in his mind. Whoever this guy was, Poe doubted he wanted to run off to Mos Eisley, to end up _blind drunk under tables, getting dragged away half-conscious and waking up dead._

Maybe, the kind of person who came up with a plan like this could take care of themselves and wouldn't need him. In fact, the paranoia had some comments about a guy who took one look at him and decided to follow him down to the detention block. But he couldn't help but think of Ben's cold assessment of 81's chances. He felt his already weary shoulders slump further. He leaned against the wall again, cold steel against his forehead.

He could do it. For a little while. If he had to. Something respectable, if not completely above ground. Run spice or parts or data. Til the guy was on his feet, set up somewhere reasonably safe. Hell, maybe they could even supply parts to the Resistance. Far enough up the chain that he'd never run into anyone he knew.

A few weeks, he thought. A few weeks, get the guy set up. _Then_ he could retire.

He could do the right thing one more fucking time.

 

 

And that's what it was, wasn't it?

 

"You were right the first time," he said to 70. It was out of the blue, to 70, who had no idea what he was talking about.

Of course he was one of _those people_. He just was; it was obvious.

If there was sign on his back, it said that he was a good person with a fierce conscience. That he'd always try to do the right thing. That he would take terrible risks to do the right thing.

It was a curse; it was in his blood just as much as Ben's Force abilities were in his. People _did_ use him. People _did_ take advantage of him. And the galaxy was probably a marginally better place because of it.

 

Well, if Yoda and Obi-Wan could run off to meditate for twenty years while the Empire hardened around them, then Poe could damn well self-destruct as an  _ex-pilot_. He could find what had been waiting for him, down the fucking drain. He was so close; it was too late, really, he was past the event horizon.

Six weeks, he'd give the guy.

 

70 was asking hopefully if what he'd been right about was trying to recover the holo. When Poe lit the saber again it was steady, but _so heavy_ in his hands. It wasn't fear or rage fueling it, but utter, exhausted resentment.

"You know you're just as guilty as they are."

"I didn't -"

"You did," Poe assured him.

 

He stabbed 3070 right through one of his eye lenses, through the back of his skull. Just north of the medulla, the operations center of the body, the precious nugget he'd taken care to vaporize when he killed 1881.

3070 would remain conscious for a few more minutes. Left to his own, he'd die in a couple of days. If someone cared to, they could keep him alive in a semi-vegetative state for years. Instead, he would receive the _coup de grace_ from Sgt Numbers, when he arrived tomorrow with a new squad, detailed with removing the bodies.

Poe saw all of this as clearly as if it had already happened.

 

He looked at the weapon in his hand for a moment. Cut the blade, and fondled the hilt for a moment more. He turned to Ben.

"You want this back?"

Ben tilted his head.

"Come."

Ben took a step toward him.

"No," Poe shook his head. His eyes tilted down to the floor, then rose again to meet the mask.

The last thing 3070 ever saw was the Master of the Knights of Ren, murderous wraith, terror of the galaxy, nightmare of troopers and civilians alike, kneeling before the staggering, blood-splattered rebel.

 


	13. Where I'm Going, You Can't Follow

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It helped if he didn't think of Finn as a trooper but as another prisoner. One that had been there a lot longer than he had.

* * *

 

He refused to sit in the rack again, even with the restraints sliced off. He had more blasters than he could hold, now. There was no place to hide the bodies and nothing with which to mop up the blood, so there was no point pretending he was doing anything but waiting for his gunner. If anyone else showed up, they'd join the dead.

He sat on the vac again, with the door open, taking the time to hydrate and quiet his mind, trying to quell the paranoia enough that he wouldn't kill his new buddy when he showed up.

...

 

He heard the door open, and the steps of a trooper picking their way around the cell. Avoiding stepping in blood, if this guy was half as smart as Poe hoped he'd be. The footsteps came up to the fresher, and a vocoded voice asked, "Are you the Resistance pilot?"

_I was, yeah._

"That's me. Who are you?"

There was a pause.

"Listen carefully. You do exactly as I say, I can get you out of here."

"Right. Can you tell a TIE/sf from the old models? On sight?

"Of course. We gotta get far, and fast. Can you fly one?"

...

 

He didn't know if Ben would even try to help to shield their escape, but he wasn't surprised when they were noticed. There were dozens of techs on the bridge, and dozens more troopers at conning stations scattered around the hull of the massive ship. Not even Ben's kind of power could blind that many minds at once. If he was even trying.

The firefight was exhilarating, the SF twirling at his fingertips and the trooper hollering as he blew away every obstacle he could get in his sights. Poe felt his heart leap light and joyful as they hit hyperspace, only to be clouded with a sullen kind of wariness as they settled into the quiet. Flying felt like being tugged back up into the Light, and he didn't want to go.

 

"Holy shit, we did it. We did it!"

"Not yet, buddy, we still gotta ditch this plane. But we got a coupla hours before we gotta worry about that."

"Right, right. We look like First Order in this thing. Shit."

_Interesting way to put that._

"I'm Poe. What's your name?"

"FN-2187, Sir."

"FN, huh? All the guys I met were FD's."

_Met. Also an interesting choice._

"Yeah, 'cause you were detained. D is for Detention."

"Makes sense. So what's N stand for?"

"Nothing. Or maybe Nobody."

"Gotcha. You don't have to tell me anything, bud."

"Not hiding anything, Sir. No one knows what N is for. Just that it's cadre track. The joke is that it stands for Nobody because no one wants to be friends with a future officer."

This seemed like the kind of cultural arcana that would be absolutely fascinating over a few drinks.

"No, like, nickname?"

"Eighty-seven, to my squad."

_Nope._

_Eff-En. Fan Fen Fin Fon Fun Fyn._

"Can I call you Finn, maybe? For now? I - have some kinda recent and unpleasant associations with - all the numbers."

"Finn. Yeah, I like that."

"Well, pleased to meet you, Finn."

"Likewise, Sir."

"Yeah, no. Call me Poe. Please."

"Really? Is that really how you guys address each other?"

"Us guys? You mean the rest of the galaxy, outside the First Order? How long you been in, man?"

"Uh, well, my whole life. At least that I can remember."

_Your whole life? How does a child enlist in a fascist army that's only even been around for - wait, how old is this kid? And - shit - is this where all those kids went???? Holy fuck._

"And I don't mean civilization, in general. I mean the Resistance. I assume I'm gonna have to start at the bottom. And you're an officer, right? I'm just - more comfortable with _Sir_ , for now. If that's alright."

_What._

"You. Want to join the Resistance?"

"Yeah... wait, will they let me?"

"Yeah, man... of course. Yeah. That's ... awesome. Wow."

 

Okay, there was a _lot_ of stuff they had to talk about, and he was not up to it right now. Right now, they had to come up with a plan for disappearing. He'd punched in coordinates for Takodana, because it was really the only place in the SF's range where they could land safely and find new transport.

He'd stopped there on his way out, but they weren't heading back to _that_ port. For one thing, there was a chance they might get shot down. For another, if he went back _there_ , he would probably end up dragging himself back to D'Qar, a prisoner of his own conscience.

But there were a couple of other big pirate havens on the planet. The largest was very large, a city, really. It had once had a proper name of its own, but no one remembered it anymore, so entrenched was the nickname _Little Shaddaa._ The Order was hated there, but not as much as credits were loved. It was the kind of place where a stormtrooper and a bloody mess of a human being, seen together, might not be completely out of place; it was just that normally they'd be seen leaving the planet, not arriving there.

And now that he was thinking about about the place, he could practically smell the smoke of street meat mingling with spice and alcoholic vapors, and his stomach was answering, and the last fucking dregs of adrenaline were dissipating, and he really didn't have time to crash now.

His stomach must have been loud, because Finn exclaimed, "Oh, hey, I brought you food!" He felt something against his shoulder and he looked back, expecting to see a ration bar in Finn's hand. But _holy mother of all suns_ it was fucking field rations. He had to be fucking dreaming.

"Aha, _Finn_ , you brilliant bastard! Which parts you got dibs on?"

"No, Sir, that's all for you. I just came on. Just, don't eat too fast, if it's been a while."

_Don't hafta tell me, kid._

STEW, NERF. The sweetest four syllables in Basic. If he ever had a kid he was gonna name it after Meal 04. He tore open the corner and inhaled the absolute nothing that met his nostrils. Squeezed a small blob into his mouth and tasted nothing but salt and everfruit and something vaguely brown. Went through the motion of chewing, even though the ears and ass that made up the meat were ground finer than the porridge comma multi that he never even bothered chewing.

There was a little sob in his voice as he thanked Finn for industry's perfect food.

"Are you okay, Sir?"

_Not at all, buddy._

"Yeah. Thank you."

...

 

As the food revived him, he played with the TIE's nav, and names started to bubble back up in his memory. There had to be someplace better than Takodana, some other neutral planet they could get to from here. Someplace they wouldn't get shot down, someplace Finn could ditch his armor, someplace they could blend in and get new clothes. 

There was that little ag planet nearby, what was it called. He'd never been there, but the fruit crates pictured fields laced with streams and dotted with patches of woods, perfect for hiding a plane behind. There had to be a few big ag ports, they could walk to one, stealing fruit from orchards along the way... Finn could wear his jacket over his underoos and look fairly normal, and Poe could scrub his clothes in a stream, and lay out naked in the sun while they dried...

 

 _Bleep! Bleep! Bleep!_  

He gasped awake to the proximity sensor. _Fuck. Dammit._ So much for paradise. Li'l Shady it was, then.

"Okay, buddy, so here's the problem. I feel like I should do most of the talking, here, but as long as we're together and you're in that armor, I can't really do anything but keep my head down and my mouth shut. You have any ideas?"

"I - take the armor off? I mean, that's kind of a priority for me anyway."

"Yeah, but where?"

"Here? Once you disembark, I can throw my shit in your seat."

_Duh. What is wrong with my head?_

_Where to begin._

"Holy shit, Finn, you're a fucking genius. Also, _disembark?_ "

"What?"

...

 

This was gonna be fine. Without a stormtrooper at his side, being a bloody mess of a human being was no big deal. Maybe even for the best, as it looked like he'd been rolled once already. Everything was gonna be just fine. He wiped the worst of the blood splatters off his jacket with spit while he waited for Finn to _disembark._

When he did, well. Speaking of things being _fine._ He'd gotten a little glimpse over his shoulder in hyperspace, but. Good heavens. Poe held out his jacket.

"This will help you blend in a little, I think."

"Thank you. What now?"

"Walk casual, like we're just here on a lark," Poe answered, setting off to the south. "But also fast. Like it's a lark we're super excited about. Smile. Look back and forth at each other like we're having a fun conversation."

"Alright. Can I tell you something that might actually make you laugh?"

"Hit me, pal."

"I think this might actually be the funnest conversation I've ever had."

The urge to stop in his tracks and grab Finn by the shoulders was so strong, Poe nearly tripped. He managed to choke out a superficial laugh, and pat Finn on the shoulder.

"Thought you said _make me laugh,_ not _make me cry_."

"Seriously. I thought a lark was a kind of bird?"

"Ohmigod."

 

They finally made it to the edge of the tarmac, skipping right past the mooring reg and into the street. When no one yelled at them to come back, Poe felt his heart lift a little. They were actually fucking doing this, they might actually get away.

They passed plenty of clothing stalls, most of them catering to scenes they didn't need to be associated with. They finally found some sturdy, neutral workwear and a couple of unflattering hats. Poe fought back a brief wave of nausea as he paid with one of the chips he'd lifted off the troopers. Bags in hand, they checked into a cleanish looking inn. He was prepared with a story about getting mugged to explain his appearance, but of course, no one asked.

Once the door to their room was shut and locked behind them, he sagged against a wall and finally, _finally_ , let himself go, shaking and laughing and crying.

"I think we did it, man. I think we made it."

Finn's posture didn't change, but his face went through a number of expressions. Poe held out his hands in the universal request for a hug. Well, nearly universal: Finn looked back and forth between them, and concluded, "Oh! You want your jacket back."

"No, dummy. Come here." Finn did, and Poe pulled him in tight and felt his tears against the impervious leather of his father's old jacket. It hurt, suddenly, that this piece of him was there to witness what had happened, what he'd done. He pulled the collar aside to press his wet face against Finn's shirt.

But Finn wasn't wearing a shirt, just his tight synthetic stormtrooper underalls, just like they all wore, and Poe jerked away like his face was burnt. He was against the wall and hit his head and _fuck everything, will nothing ever be nice ever again?_

 

"Are you okay, Sir?" Finn's voice was startlingly gentle.

"No! Of course not! And don't call me that."

Kriff, he'd been called _Sir_ more times in the last day than in his entire time with the Resistance, and by the men whose blood was staining the clothes he was still wearing.

"Please. I wish you'd call me Poe. But. You can call me Dameron, you can call me _asshole_ , you can even call me late to dinner, just," he shook his head, "Please."

"Okay. I gotcha," Finn nodded, as he pulled Poe back against his chest. "It's okay, Poe. It's gonna be okay."

"I'm sorry."

"No. Don't be."

_Okay._

_..._

 

He had a good long hot-water shower. He hadn't wanted to let go of Finn. He wondered if everything that had happened had twisted him somehow, and his attitude toward fucking stormtroopers. 

_Fucking stormtroopers, get it?_

_Oh hell, even my trauma thinks it's a fucking comedian._

It helped if he didn't think of Finn as a trooper but as another prisoner. One that had been there a lot longer than he had.

He was great. He was super sharp, and he was so nice; he'd brought him food. Or maybe, that wasn't a big deal, maybe they always carried rations ... had _his_ squad been carrying them? He scanned the plasteel pockets and pouches in his memory ... and then he was speculating about their meal schedules, their downtime ... what they did in the barracks of an evening ... how many copies of the holo had gotten out ... and then he was asking himself, again, what he could've done differently, what he should've done differently, if he hadn't wanted the guards looking at him like that.

It didn't take long to figure out that almost any stray thought, allowed to wander freely, would lead him there. Like a fucking grav beam.

_That's normal. There's nothing wrong with me. That's gonna happen for a while._

He was okay. A little tense, definitely not panicking. On the other hand, he had no idea how long he'd been standing in the shower.

 

Finn was looking out the window at the lights and signs and vehicles, but closed the shade as Poe stepped out of the fresher.

"Sorry I hogged it for so long. That was..."

_What? The fuck you apologizing for?_

"Sorry."

He curled under the barely adequate blankets. Finn sat at the small table.

"Right, I guess you haven't actually been up long."

"No, but you have. Sleep. I'll be good for at least twelve hours."

"Twelve - Finn, we don't hafta take shifts. We can both sleep. Whenever you get tired, just, hit the hay. You don't have to wait for me. And you definitely don't hafta wake me up."

_Sit with me, talk to me. Right here, right next to me. Don't sit silently three meters away._

It was probably, no, certainly for the best. Shit was complicated enough; they had a lot to talk about in the morning, and the news about Bee was urgent. The only reason he was stopping to sleep at all was necessity. He was already forgetting stuff, spacing out; not all of his decisions had been ideal, although they were here and safe and that was enough for now. He'd fallen asleep at the stick - in hyperspace, sure, but on a very a short trip. It had been a nice dream, though. At least he could have that. Some off-season pasture, bathing in a stream and laying out in the sun to dry...

 

* * *

 

Poe could've slept for ten hours. Hell, he probably could have slept for days. He woke after 3 hours, like usual. Usually he would compose lyrics in his head or masturbate or just think about stuff for a little while and then fall asleep for another three or four hours. But all he could think was that some of the tasks ahead of them were extremely time-sensitive.

1.) He had to risk sending a relay transmission to the Resistance. It would take Finn at least a couple of days to get there, and they needed to start moving on that intel yesterday. 

2.) They couldn't afford passage for either of them until they washed the four troopers' piece accounts, and Finn's too, if he had one. Poe expected the take to be pretty slim, minus the cleaner's cut. He hoped it would be enough for Finn's passage, at least.

3.) He expected the accounts to be locked once the bodies were found, which would be soon. 

 

The longer he stayed in bed, the more likely it was he'd have to start his retirement by hustling to get them off the planet. And that he did not want. For one thing, he didn't want Finn seeing that. For another, he was still a fucking mess. The swelling in his nose had gone down a little, but not enough.

He sighed and dragged himself to the edge of the bed. He explained the situation to Finn, and they trudged together out into the sleepless pirate city.

 

* * *

 

They returned, takeout and caf in hand, absolutely elated. Finn had known how much was in his account, but not how much it was worth anywhere else. Poe was staggered. The troopers' individual life savings weren't  _piece_ accounts. They were  _peace_ accounts, nest eggs for the eventual triumph of the First Order, when the war machine would be streamlined and the order's subjects expected to trade the duty of killing for that of producing, procreating, and modelling upright and loyal behavior for their fellow-subjects.

Finn didn't believe in said peace. He didn't think peace on the First Order's terms was even possible. And he was certain that if he stayed in he wouldn't live to see it. The real reason, he said, that frugality was encouraged as a virtue was that the troopers' savings resolved to the Order when they died. 

It was genius, really. If any New Republic auditors got the idea that the Order's conscripts were some kind of slaves, they had only to point to the generous salaries and enviable savings accounts, along with the wise policy of encouraging their soldiers to plan for peace. And it cost them almost nothing.

Genius, Poe agreed. He'd rewritten his last wishes when he joined the Resistance, and had wanted to name the organization itself. He was told  _absolutely not_ by an offended clerk. Well, he was about to hand them a hell of a lot more than was in his own meager account. Or rather, Finn was about to hand it to them. Poe took for himself just enough to live on for a year. 

...

 

They laid out their agendas. Finn wanted to join the Resistance, and he'd assumed that Poe would be the one taking him there. To vouch for him, if nothing else. But ideally, to help him fit in, too. He was afraid he'd still be Nobody, but in a different army.

Poe couldn't imagine anyone meeting Finn and seeing nobody, although he could admit he had good reason to be biased. He knew intel, at least, were going to sit up and take notice; they would have even without the information Finn would be delivering for him. Not to mention the credits. Hell, everyone was gonna sit up and take notice, and he was obliged to do what he could to make sure Finn attracted the right kind of attention.

 

Poe wanted to disappear. He wouldn't say where or how, anything that Finn could reveal to anyone else. In fact, he wanted Finn to tell his old comrades he'd died in the escape:

"I know they won't wanna believe I could crash a functioning plane, so, tell them I was really fucked up by that Force interrogation. Dizzy spells, that kind of thing; I wouldn'a been any use to them anymore anyway. Anyway, I fucked up, we took heavy fire, I hit your eject, didn't give you a choice. You saw me go down, saw me crash and burn, you were still hanging in your chute at two thousand meters."

"You _were_ really fucked up by that interrogation. You're fucked up now. I mean, I didn't know you before, but..."

 

Finn's eyes were so warm and soft and full of concern, it almost hurt to look at him. Rather, it hurt to look and not have his head on Finn's shoulder and Finn's arms around him. It _wasn't_ just his looks. Honestly. It was like they'd been reborn when they'd escaped and they were part of one another now. He'd only known him a few hours and he was going to miss Finn more than anyone else.

There  _was_ no one else. He'd already grieved over everyone else; they were gone. All these tasks and arrangements were simply going through the motions, tying up loose ends, the better to forget. Finn was his only friend, his only acquaintance even, in the whole goddamned galaxy. 

 

"I know you want this. And, I owe you everything. But, Poe. I don't want to introduce myself to the Resistance, to _your friends_ , by lying to them."

Poe nodded. Really no way around that, was there?

"When you put it that way. I can't ask you to do that."

He scrubbed his scalp, trying to think.

"So. Okay. This is good, this gives me a chance to write some notes. Say goodbye, good luck, tell people what of my stuff they can have. And how great you are. You can deliver them; that'll be part of m-my v-vouch. For you." His voice broke as he made the promise. 

It was one thing to discuss parting ways; it was another to  _promise_. It hurt.

He pulled their clasped hands closer and put his forehead down on Finn's knuckles.

_Please don't go. Come with me. I'll change my plans, I'll get a regular job, I'll fly, intrasystem, close to home. I'll fly atmospheric. I'll load crates. I'll do anything, I'll sell ugly clothes to fugitives, I'll scrub freshers in a joint like this, in this very one, even, we can just live in this room forever and never leave._

 

But Finn had to go. For himself, and because it was the surest way to get the message to Leia about Bee, eir trajectory, and the vital, galaxy-upending data ey possessed.

Not that Finn wasn't an asset in his own right, but if it was only him, Poe would try, at least, to talk him into running away together. But the mission was more important than either of them. And it was Finn's mission, now.

 

His tears were soaking between their clasped fingers. He pulled away, apologizing. He tried to pull his hands away but Finn tightened his grip. Finn's gaze was soft but penetrating, and Poe felt caught in it, exposed; it was almost frightening. 

"One of the things I've heard, about the Resistance, is that they take care of their people when they're wounded."

"What, the Order doesn't? Doesn't surprise me, I guess." The apparent change of topic allowed Poe to tear his eyes away, down to his lap.

"It seems to me," Finn said, firm and deliberate, "that you've been wounded. In the line of duty. And that you deserve to be taken care of, just as much as if you'd been shot."

"Ha, listen to you."

"You don't think Kylo Ren injured you?"

"Oh, I _know_ he did. Buddy, you are preaching to the high priestess and all the doves and virgins, right here. I've had to have the _brain injury_ talk with more people than I care to count. Just - usually I'm the one giving it."

"So... you agree."

"That my head is fucked, yes. That I should go back and take up time and resources to try to do anything about it?" He shook his head, "I know I'm entitled to it. But I don't really think it would help. And honestly," he was a little ashamed to admit, "I don't want it."

"You might feel differently when -"

"Don't. Finn. I'm not changing my mind. And I don't want to fight with you."

"Okay. Poe."

They sat silent for a moment.

 

"You saw me laughing, before? I know I looked crazy. I was kinda, fantasizing. About asking you to run away with me. Stupid, I know."

"I would, though. If there wasn't a war coming. But I can't just, leave now."

"You're a better soldier than I, Finn."

"No. No! Poe, you've _been_ fighting, look at you! Seriously, look at yourself in a mirror! You're -" he stopped, frustrated. "You've done your part, maybe. But I haven't. And I can't walk away."

"I know. I know."

 

 

* * *

 

Sometimes, it's the little things. In this case, the things were about 8mm, growing off his chin, and a shocking number of them were white.

"Get it, Finn? _Silver lining?_ " he asked, grinning eagerly.

Finn regarded him blankly.

_What, they don't have puns in the First Order? Poor kid._

And then, just when he was about to shrug his shoulders, the corner of Finn's mouth just _barely_ twisted. Holy shit, Finn was giving him _the look_. A slow blink, a dismissive fraction of a head shake, s _weet mother of moons, where did he learn to do that?_

And Poe was sending him to D'Qar; there would be _two_ of them now, Finn and Jess. The thought of being caught, strung up on his own words, twisting in the wind under their twin stares was ... almost too much to resist. Pure, platonic torture. He shook his head, trying to dislodge the thought, at least for the moment.

 

But seriously. The stubble he'd grown in detention would be an asset so long as he was stuck in the Western Reaches with Finn. He'd rarely been seen with more than a days' worth of growth. He couldn't have known when it had gotten so white, or if maybe that had just happened in the past few days.

The new kink in his nose helped camouflage him, too. And it wasn't as bad as he imagined. It wasn't bad at all. It was sorta handsome, in a rugged, Outer Rim, grey market kind of way.

Between the nose and the stubble and the hat that he wouldn't want to be caught dead in, he hardly recognized himself. It was just for a few days, while he escorted Finn as far as Naboo and a resistance contact there. Naboo would also give him a chance to buy some _real_ clothes. Some starter jewelry, scented oils, that kind of thing.

 

Everything was gonna be _fine_.

 

* * *

 


	14. Doe Eyes

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Twenty months later.

* * *

 

 

It was noon in the spaceport on the planet below. Shuttles to and from the station glinted in the sunlight like fingerlings. At night, the atmosphere blossomed like firey clover as they punched in and out. 

Doe Eyes stopped at the viewport in the morning, whenever morning happened to be for him, watching the traffic and the weather. If only there were bidgens cooing around his bench, the illusion of senescence would be complete.

This particular morning he was blissfully un-hungover, the rare consequence of having been put down hard the night before. A new, generously gifted silk shirt caressed his flanks. There was tansi on his breath, jasmine oil on his pulse points, and the prospect of a trip to Ord Bur on his mind. He felt ready to eat the galaxy.

 

Sadly, there was no galaxy to eat; the salon was like a morgue. Just a handful of regulars, sitting alone over their drinks or playing halfhearted card games. Mémé alone at the bar, watching the soaps. He wrapped his arms around her shoulders and kissed the top of her head. She squirmed away.

"Don't you touch me with that!"

"With what?" he asked innocently.

"Ew! Weren't you just with the Twins?"

"You know they're not really twins," he murmured close in her ear, and licked her cheek.

"So you say, and I choose to believe it," she said with exaggerated primness.

He sat down and began to trying to signal for a drink. The place might be dead, but Yul was going to make him wait anyway.

"Please tell me their sonic's running, at least."

"Naw, they gave up on that thing," he lied, just to see her reaction. "Not worth the effort; who needs it?"

She was like 95% sure he was having her on. She gratified him with a barf face anyway; the more grossed out she was, the more goddamned pleased with himself he looked.

"If they can afford nice rooms, they can afford to take it to a real shop."

"Well, Rory says that they're real stubborn about it. They don't like anyone else touching their rig. It's a pride thing."

"Rory says? What, they don't talk, now, either?"

He laughed out loud.

"No, what I'm saying is, ey's on your side. They're being stubborn."

"Fucking pilots," she huffed. 

"Fucking pilots," he agreed cheerfully, "and their fucking droids, too."

 

* * *

 

(The Bana Twins were a pair of couriers who came through once or twice a month. They averaged about 50/50 smuggling versus legitimate business, though they weren't above outright piracy if a decent target presented itself.  They were more than just a welcome break from the monotony. He'd have felt blessed to have met them under any circumstances.

Their game had started off innocently enough: licking them clean after sex, a tame little rule about not speaking until spoken to. Over a year later, now, he wasn't allowed to use his mouth for anything _but_ cleaning their bodies. No kissing, no blowjobs, no cunnilingus; he thought there was a good case to be made for analingus, but of course, he wasn't allowed to make it, because unless something was really wrong, there was absolutely no talking, on his part. They even punished him for wordless groans and whimpers.

Sometimes, when Coll really needed it, they rescinded the rules entirely. Other times, when Doe Eyes really needed it, they expanded them beyond just sex, to most or all of their visit. Sometimes, in private, they would talk about him like an object, not addressing him directly; he felt calm and safe when they did that. But he had yet to convince them to try it in public.

Last night he'd spent well over an hour licking and scrubbing them clean; they'd spent the rest of the night defiling him. 

Eventually he was on his knees, licking santorum off Coll's cock, the man's hands gentle in his hair, ready to pull him off and slap him if he tried to take too much into his mouth at once. Brea tickled the crack of his ass with her belt, waiting for him to so much as mew so she could whip him. Pet names had filled his ears: _good boy, such a pretty boy, dirty whore, filthy shit-sucking whore, such a good boy._

When Coll was satisfied, he'd pulled away, stroking himself hard again, and Brea had pulled Doe Eyes back up against her knees, and Coll towered over him, the threat in his eyes as hard as he could muster. She'd pulled his head back into her lap, baring and stretching his throat, and Coll had plunged slowly down into him, too slow, until his weight was on him, and Doe Eyes' hand was twitching violently as he tried to stop himself from tapping out. Only after he'd tapped out three separate times, and his face was flushed and teary, did he get the vigorous facefucking he wanted.

He'd been ecstatic; there were no words to describe how grateful he was to have made the right choices in his life, the ones that had brought him to this room with these people.)

 

* * *

 

Yul finally acknowledged him, pushing a glass of water and a bowl of chips at him.

"Hey hey! You're coming back with my whisky!"

"You're looking well this _morning,_ " the bartender answered dryly.

"This is a _space. station_."

"In _geo.synchrononous. orbit_."

"It's past noon! And since when do I hafta give a fuck? Just because _you_ work in shifts, doesn't mean the rest of us hafta live by your regimented little..." Yul had heard this rant a hundred times. He walked away and took his sweet time coming back with a drink.

 

Mémé beamed at him.

“Did I tell you about Jedi guy?”

“Like, recently?” He was pretty sure he'd remember something about a Jedi.

"Like, yesterday. You're gonna love this. One-eighth Jedi, to be exact."

“One-eighth. Is that how that works. I feel so ignorant."

"Yeah, you, me, the rest of the galaxy, and the Force itself."

"Did he try to mind-trick you?"

"What do you think?"

"Psh." He pitied the fool that estimated his Mémé as weak-minded. "Wha'd he try to get you to do?"

"Bareback, for starters."

"Oh, one of those assholes," he smirked. The smile fell off her face, but she resisted chiding him. He'd gotten a lot better. 

"I saw that look. It's not with every random asshole, you know. Just some people I really like."

"Like the _Twins?_ " She wrinkled her nose.

"Exactly. So anyway, this Jedi jerk..."

"Right, fucking hell, this guy. He says." She was so tickled she could hardly speak. "Get this. He says - his _semen_ -”

“NO!” he roared, eyes wide with delight.

“YES!” she shrieked. “Has regenerative powers!” She threw her head back with laughter.

"Ah ha, just what you need for your tired old -"

" _Watch it, girl._ "

"Did you save me some? I could use it on my crows' feet."

"Don't you dare! Your crows' feet are adorable."

"I can't believe I've never heard that one before! That's brilliant."

"But listen, this is the best part."

“Better than magic jizz? No way.”

“He pronounced - ah, ha - pronounced it middiklor- _eens."_

It was impossible to explain just why that was so funny, but Doe Eyes thought he might pull a muscle laughing.

“Klor- _eens_!”

Yul was back and looking appalled.

“No one likes being made fun of,” he whispered angrily.

“He's not here!”

“Or thinking they might _be_ made fun of.”

“Dude, there's _no one_ here.”

She nodded around the nearly-empty barroom, populated only by a few regulars who were just there to drink. A few of them would've appreciated the anecdote themselves, and none of them gave a flying fuck about two housies having a giggle fit at the end of the bar. Yul tilted his head in acknowledgment, and asked them _nicely_ with his eyes to keep it the hell down.

“Three words, Yul.” Doe Eyes grinned up at him, conspiratorially. “Magic. Jedi. Semen.”

Yul smirked despite himself. Shook his head once and walked away- and made a beeline for the stockroom.

“He's fucking wetting his pants in there, isn't he?”

“Yeah he is.”

“Klor- _eens.”_

"Klor- _eeeens."_

 

* * *

 

He was seriously ready to go back to his room for a nap when some prospects finally showed. A team of miners, fresh out of the field, still in their Exobaron coveralls. They slogged to a large table and slumped in their seats. Two of them came up to order for the group and Mémé snagged one by the elbow.

"Where you folks coming from?"

"A very special 1,200 square-k piece of hell in the Sighez belt. It's called _some long-ass buncha numbers._ Ever heard of it?"

"No, sounds awful. I'd love to hear more about it."

The miner looked over his shoulder at the rest of the team. The one person whose eyes were actually open smiled and shrugged, so the four of them carried over drinks for the whole table. Mémé wedged in next to her new friend.

The foreman stood and offered his seat to Doe Eyes, sizing up his nearly-empty drink. He frowned at the two gofers.

"I'm sorry. They're very tired right now. They usually have better manners. What're you having?"

"Whisky soda, why, thank you."

A beefy 20-something was apologizing, "Be honest with ya, girls, I think we're all pretty shitcanned. Imma be too drunk to fuck in about half an hour."

"That's okay. It's not like there's any action here to miss out on."

"Always this quiet around here?"

"Hell no. Wouldn't be here if it was."

"Well, don't let us keep ya, but as long as we're not, please stay. I mean it, just lemme, lemme _look_ at ya. Both of ya, fucking angels."

"Not so bad yourself."

Snorts went around the table.

"Tomorrow, now, that's another story," another miner grinned wide and lascivious.

"Comm me, I'll bring you breakfast."

"Better make it lunch."

"So what's with all the nothing going on here? Is there something happening? Planetside?"

"Ain't heard nothin."

"No complaints, tho."

"Seriously, quiet's good."

"Ain't up for a party."

"Wouldn't let me into a party, stinking like this."

Doe Eyes caught the opening, "I know y'all are beat, but. I give really good showers. Massages, too."

It was worth a try. 

 

"Whaddyall do for fun around here?"

"Chat up handsome strangers."

More snorts.

"Why the hell you talking to us then?"

Chuckles.

"How long did y'all say you were out?"

"Eight weeks."

"On a dry fucking rock."

"Not a drop to drink."

"Fourteen hours a day."

"Twelve."

"Plus gear-up."

"Yeah, fourteen."

_"Eight weeks."_

"Not a drop."

"Cult owns the rock."

"Couldn't have any rations with fish in 'em, either."

"Bright side to every moon."

"Anyway, we're gettin proper fucking drunk."

"Smashed."

"Obliterated."

"But seriously, we'll be around for a coupla days. Believe me, you'll get enough of these chuckleheads."

 

The foreman returned with fresh drinks. Doe Eyes let his fingertips brush across the man's knuckles as he accepted. 

"I was just telling your crew. I give the best showers. Legendary. _Healing._ "

The foreman smiled warmly. "Sounds lovely. I'd probably fall asleep in there." But he allowed him to snuggle up against his side, slipping a thick, muscular arm around his waist. "Don't let us keep you, if you gotta go. If better company shows up."

_What a gentleman, kriff._

 

"What about you guys," someone said, "Gats? Roche? You don't even hafta _do_ anything."

"I mean, you're both gorgeous," answered one obviously female miner, "but I'm, ah, licked already." Groans of laughter went around the table.

"Yeah, and I've seen her drunk; she's _tight_ with the credits. Better wait for when she's sober."

"Now Pizo, here, on the other hand."

The youngest-looking member of the team dropped his face into his hands. They could see the blush through his fingers.

"Guys! That was like a year ago!"

"He met this girl on OMS3."

He felt the foreman stiffen beside him.

"OMS2," someone corrected.

"Right. OMS2. Totally fell for him. Bought him an _analog chrono._  Near emptied his account."

"It wasn't that fancy. It wasn't that much money. It was my first time away from home," Pizo recited, for what sounded like the hundredth time.

 

They went around and around like this, the fond if merciless teasing of people who have spent far too much time stuck together. They kept the drinks coming, and the pair of hookers weren't shy about accepting. The miners began to drop off one by one, with kisses to their knuckles and salutations like _goodnight beautiful_ and promises to _rock their worlds_ after a few good hours of shuteye. The foreman released Doe Eyes to let one of his crew, almost as young as Pizo, nuzzle his face in his hair.

 

"Yr so pretty, sorry m'so drunk," he slurred. "I wanna be with you."

"You wanna pay me just to take a nap with you?"

"Mebbye."

"Good  _night_ , Pol."

"Okay. But. Tomorrow tho... how many you girls usually roun' here?"

"Pol. What did we _say_ about that?"

"Aw, he doesn't mind. Do you, sweetheart?"

"What don't I mind?"

"That I call you guys _girls_. 'S just a habit. 'S not, like, a insult."

"Oh, of course it's not. Hell, when I was a kid, most of my heroes were women."

"Me too!"

"If anything it's a compliment."

"You don't get it," growled the foreman. "If this galaxy has any heroes left, they're _all_ women. You know: the ones that didn't fuck up, or turn dark, or run away. It's not an insult to you, kid. It's an insult to them _._ "

 

Well, damn.

 

It sounded like something _Commander Dameron_ would have said. He'd had this kind of conversation before, had led this conversation, back when he was responsible for the behavior of his people. His _kids_ , some of them, their first time away from home, carrying with them all kinds of blind prejudices from their homeworlds.

 

He looked up at Pol.

"Your boss is right, you know."

"Yeah, I know. 'Sa bad habit. You think I'ma jerk?"

"No, honey."

"Good," Pol nuzzled his hair again and mumbled in his ear, "Cause yr the hottest thing on two feet, _mister_. M'gonna give it to you so good, you won' even remember what _species_ you are."

"Well then," Doe Eyes patted his shoulder. "You should go rest up for that."

 

...

 

He stumbled, loose and dissatisfied, back to the bar, where Mémé had already regained her perch. He slouched back next to her in a funk.

"What's wrong, girl? Why so pissy?"

"Don't call me that," he snapped.

"Okay,  _asshole_ , why so pissy? They were fun."

He just huffed.

"Boss sure took a shine to you, anyway."

"Yeah, that's why he's up there and I'm down here."

"Oh, you know how those remotes are. Give 'em time to shit, shower and sleep it off."

"Pfffffff," he answered. All he could hear was the man's indictment echoing between his ears:

_Fucked up._

_Turned dark._

_Ran away._

 

"Tell me something, Mé. How do people get to be that age and still give a fuck."

"Fuck if I know, 'wise."

 

* * *

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ***** If you're looking for a happy-ish ending to this story, this would be a good place to stop reading and skip to another part in the [series](http://archiveofourown.org/series/587056). *****  
>   
> -  
> Mémé is short for Padme. Fifty years after Queen Amidala's death, her name remains popular, albeit for different reasons for different generations. In the early days of the New Republic, it evoked both nostalgia for the past and hope for the future. Now, with a new civil war taking its toll, the galactic mood is cynical. Padme is such a common nom du rue for sex workers, it's practically a cliché.


	15. High and Small and Bright

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sooo, this is the last chapter. If you've read all the warnings, and one of them hasn't happened yet, you probably know where this is headed.

* * *

 

 

Yul set down what he swore was their last round. Rom nova for Mémé and whiskey soda for Doe Eyes, who scowled at the weak tint.

“Last one til dinner, kids. Orders.”

Doe Eyes gnashed his teeth obscenely back.

“Let me know when my _dinner_ walks in.” He continued licking his teeth filthily until the barman rolled his eyes and walked away.

“Parsimonious little fuck.”

“Aw, leave him be,” she chided, “he's just doing his job.”

"Traitor."

“Love you too.”

He bent down and made love to his straw for a few seconds. There was no one watching; it was just a habit.

 

She nudged his arm.

“Well _hello_ there.”

 

He looked up at the stranger that had just entered. He was _fine_. That was a vintage pressure suit he was wearing. Either he was rich enough to wear a collector's item around, or he was competent enough to keep one running. Either was attractive. Even more attractive was the physique that it clung to, a hard ribbon of _yes, please_ , only a little taller than himself. If it was possible for a rebreather helmet to be handsome, his was; two slim atmo tanks hung discreetly from his belt.

The stranger ordered a drink and rolled out a little tube, attaching it to the straw. Doe Eyes turned to him to flirt, dropping one shoulder, batting his thick lashes. The stranger stiffened. _Too much, maybe?_ He returned to fellating his straw, while Mémé ran her nails over her nipples.

She was moving to get up and approach the guy, when he pushed away his half-finished drink and motioned to Yul. A few quiet words, and the bartender nodded toward the other end of the bar, near the door. He was gonna talk to the boss. Maybe he was looking for someone else, xeno, maybe, or maybe he wanted something special.

 

He watched the two negotiate, the little theater of crow and vulture dividing a carcass. Eventually they settled. She was glaring as she spoke, pointing a glittering finger for emphasis. After locking eyes with the trick for an uncomfortably long time, she nodded at Doe Eyes and beckoned.

"That's me then. This looks like fun."

He hopped up and stumbled, catching himself on her shoulder.

"Alright, babe?"

"Yeah yeah. I'll see ya."

He did his best to put on an air of insouciance as he strutted over, half-consciously assessing the odds on the guy's race and what he had in the tanks. He wondered if the guy was always into humans, or just when he was with whores. His shitty mood preferred to think the latter. And his shitty mood didn't have much time left. Not with Revi holding out a jewel-bedecked arm for him to slide under.

 

She exuded some kind of pheremone. She had to be right on top of you to really get the full effect. Staff and customers alike found themselves bashful and trusting around her. The staff didn't discuss it much; it was kind of embarrassing. Some actively resented it. When Doe Eyes was younger he might have resented it too, maybe tried to resist it. But at this point in his life he couldn't care, even liked it sometimes. Sometimes he wished he could just crawl into her bosom and suffocate there.

 

She draped her arm around him and kissed his temple.

“How's my baby?”

“I'm good, mama,” he said softly, eyes downcast.

“This is my Doe Eyes.” She sounded like she was proud of him. “Baby, this is Kim. Say hi.”

He looked shyly at the svelte pilot. “Hi Kim.”

“Kim is going to be in port for a couple of days, and he wants you to keep him company.”

He blushed. She made it sound like Kim thought he was special. He smiled wide, feeling grateful, but couldn't make himself look at the man again. He felt like he was going to start giggling. Revi pulled her arm back a bit, resting her hand on his shoulder.

“He wants you to stay with him on his ship.”

She'd said _a couple of days._

“You mean," he whispered, wide-eyed, "the whole time?”

“Don't worry kid, I won't be too hard on ya. I gotta lotta work to do. You'll get plenty of rest.”

That wasn't what he was worried about.

“You'll be checking in with me, little one. I want you back here for meals. Make sure you're getting some real food.”

He smirked, despite himself. _Something besides booze and jizz,_ she meant. He nearly said it aloud. Instead, he turned to her timidly.

“Um,” he asked.

“Of course, baby.” She released him and stepped to the bar. She produced a couple of bottles and handed them to the stranger.

“This is going on your bill. Make sure he paces himself.”

“Copy that, ma'am.”

 _Copy that, ma'am._ He sounded so competent, authoritative, even. As Revi took another step away, he could feel his trust and obedience slipping from her and attaching itself to the pilot. He was going to be good for Kim. He was sure Kim would be good to him, too.

“I mean it. You see that face? He comes back with so much as one eyelash out of place, you're paying for it in _organs_. You understand?”

“Understood, ma'am.”

She locked eyes with Doe Eyes one last time before slipping back into her office.

“You. Morning. Here. Food.”

The spell had lifted, and he winked at her, “You got it, boss.”

...

 

They walked to the hangar in near silence, the trick catching him a couple of times when he stumbled, mumbling, “Watch it,” and then more harshly “I _said_ watch it.” Kim pushed him up the ramp and dragged him back to the bunk. Doe Eyes sank to his knees as soon as they crossed the threshold.

“Stop that, get up.” The stranger seated him on the bunk. “Can you stay _right here_ for ten minutes?”

“You tell me how long you want it to last,” he said, reaching for the flap of the pressure suit. The man grasped his wrists firmly.

“Stop. You have to wait.”

“Why you wanna wait for, honey?” he pouted, “ What can I do for you?”

“Right now?”

“Mm-hm.”

“What I really need from you, right now? Is to stay _right here_ for just ten minutes while I do some business things. Can you do that for me?”

 

He rolled his eyes. Was there something in the fucking air supply? Making people _not-horny_? He should have just stayed in bed. He'd jerked off that morning with Coll's dirty underwear draped over his face. He could've done that all day. Should've, apparently.

 

“Yeah, leave me one of those bottles, sure.”

“You could hardly walk getting here!”

Kim had seemed so strong and authoritative at first, why was he being such a prude all of a sudden?

“Listen, mister, it's okay if you don't know exactly what you want. Let me. I've done this a lot.” He reached for the flap again. “I mean, _a lot._ You're in good hands.”

“Fuck,” Kim spoke harshly as he stepped away. “You don't understand. I - I know _exactly_ what I want.”

He opened a drawer and pulled out a bundle of cord. Doe Eyes sucked in a sharp breath, his face lighting up.

“Oh, wow, is that what you guys were arguing about? How much she charge ya for _that?_ ”

When Kim didn't answer, he whistled low. "Damn, buddy, you got balls. Balls you're gonna lose if she finds out about this."

"Are you going to tell her?"

"Hell no, I won't say nothing." He looked up sincerely at Kim. "I don't get much of that around here. Fuck, you just got me so hot, you have no idea."

“Show me - the most comfortable position for you. You might be like that for a while.”

Doe Eyes lay back, arms parallel behind his back, tucked under his lumbar spine. He spread his legs wide and bent, soles of his feet touching. Tilted his head back, jaw loose, looked Kim drowsily in the eye. “Please, mister, I need your cock. Please.”

Kim froze for a moment before shaking his head.

“Hope you're, fucking well, ready for this. Boy. Roll over.”

Doe Eyes hummed gratefully and started to comply, then realized, “Wait, my clothes.”

“If I have to cut anything off, I'll buy you _two_ new ones, I promise. Anything you want, sky's the limit. But, I don't think that's gonna happen. I'm only interested in one thing.”

“Only way to shut me up, boss,” he grinned, licking his lips.

Kim straightened his legs and pulled them together. “Sorry, I'm gonna do your legs like this.”

“However you want it, honey.”

Kim snorted. “Kriff, nothing in this galaxy is how I want it.” He tested the rope with his fingers. "How's that? You comfortable enough?”

“Mmm, yeah.You can ride my face _all night_ like this.”

Kim took two chains out from the drawer and proceeded to chain his purchase, ankles and waist, to the frame. “So you don't try to come crawling after me.”

“ _After_ you? What! You can't _leave!_ ”

“ _Ten minutes._ I promise. You just lie here and think about- about what I'm gonna do to you when I get back, okay?”

 

* * *

 

As soon as the door slid shut behind him, Iolo ripped the helmet off and gulped air into his lungs. He slid to the floor, slumped against the wall, and wiped the tears from his face.

_Stubborn kriffing sonofabitch._

He fingered the hypo in his pocket regretfully. Plan A had been to tranq Poe the moment the hatch closed, but he was _hammered_. It was a long trip, too, back to base. A long fucking trip.

    _Fuck._

When his breath steadied, he got up to begin the preflight sequence.

 

* * *

 

In the bunk, the trussed captive rolled his tongue around in his mouth, daydreaming about what sounded like several hours of facefucking in his near future. He internalized what he'd seen of Kim's buttons, so far, things he could provoke the man with. When Kim had finally broken through his hesitancy, he'd been plenty rough. But it was like pulling teeth to get him there.

He lost track of his thoughts. That happened a lot, now. He heard noises from the ship, whirrings and clicks. For a moment he pictured the pumps and actuators and then shook the thought away.

_Pilot stuff. None of my business._

Were they going somewhere? Revi should have told him. Maybe she had, and he'd just forgotten. That happened sometimes, now, too.

... 

 

By the time Kim got back, he was hot and dreamy and writhing with need. He opened his mouth and begged with his eyes. Kim sat by his head and stroked his hair.

“How we doin?”

“Need my daddy.”

“Don't call me that, please.”

“Why not, daddy?”

Kim's fingers tensed. "Please, please don't."

“Uh, that's it, daddy. Pull my hair.”

Kim didn't answer. But it was working; he was vibrating with tension, breathing heavily through the respirator. Doe Eyes held his tongue for a moment, listening to the loud breathing.

 

“Anyone ever tell you you sound like Darth Vader?”

Kim stood up abruptly and turned to leave again.

“You know what that means, right? _Dark Father.”_

“For fuck's sake, man! You _have_ a father, he -"

_Shit._

_Misses you. Was going to be the rest of that sentence._  

 

_What._

“The fuck did you just say.”

_And who._

“The fuck are you. Who was it, you filthy fucking scalp-hunting scum? Was it him? Was it Leia? Or was it the other side?" 

"No -"

"What am I _worth_ , asshole?” his face twisted into a wild-eyed rictus and he was screaming, now, “ _What are you getting for tearing my life apart_?!”

“No, no, it's not a bounty!” Iolo pulled the helmet off, gasping. “It's - a rescue mission. I'm sorry I had to trick you. We didn't think you'd come on your own.”

Poe gaped at him, betrayal blazing in his eyes.

“Gods-damn right I wouldn't," he snarled. "The only thing I wanted from you assholes was an honorable fucking execution, and I know force fucking well you wouldn't give it to me!”

"Oh, no, no, Poe ..." 

Iolo knelt beside him at eye level, saying _No-one wants to kill you_ and something about _getting you the care you need._ Poe jerked away from his touch.

“Why! Why couldn't you just leave me! Fuck's sake, leave me here, or fucking kill me, please Iolo, fuck you, who the fuck asked you to do this!”

“Everyone! When we got a line on you, everyone wanted to volunteer. _Everyone_ , Poe. We figured I had the least, uh, recognizable body type. Out of all the, you know, guys. And,” he grimaced, "you know."

    _I know what you like._

At that Poe could only wail, “Please, please don't do this.” He rolled into the corner and smashed his head hard against the bulkhead. It rang him like a bell, left him dizzy and seeing stars. He did it again, and again.

“Poe, stop, you're going to hurt yourself!”

“You leave this room to fly this ship," he snarled, "you'll come back to find my fucking brains all over this fucking bunk."

_Smash._

_Smash._

Iolo straddled Poe and pinned his shoulders; begging him not to hurt himself. In response Poe started screaming for help. Iolo was acutely aware of the respectable security presence; he clamped one hand over Poe's mouth.

He wasn't just thinking about  _paying in organs;_ he was thinking that if he lost Poe this time, they'd never get another chance.

Poe began kicking at the bulkhead with the few free inches of chain. Iolo tried to imagine how loud it would be outside, although any number of maintenance jobs involved similar banging. And then his heart dove straight into his guts as he realized there was a pattern to the tattoo. He wasn't as fluent in binary as Poe, but he could guess pretty well that it was something like HELP. He panicked.

He slid his knees down around Poe's legs and kicked back at his shins. He pushed down hard with the hand over Poe's mouth, and reached into his pocket with the other. Pulled out the hypo and stuck it in Poe's shoulder.

Poe howled through his fingers, “You bastard, I fucking hate you!”

 

Iolo wrapped himself tight around his old friend until the drug kicked in.

    _Fucking binary_.

He wondered bitterly, and with some pride, whether the unctuous bartender and the glittering madam had any clue what a fine soldier they'd had in their midst.

Muffled screams and thrashing gradually gave way to sobbing, and then to sniffling. He cautiously loosened his hold.

"Hey, Poe, you with me? You okay?"

Poe glared miserably as Iolo wiped his face clean. He stared over the rebel's shoulder at Ileenium hanging low and red on the bulkhead behind him. He wished Iolo could see it too, maybe he'd understand, then, why he couldn't do this... He blinked, each blink longer and heavier than the last.

 

Iolo was still talking to him; it sounded like he was telling a fairy tale.

"Whatever he did to you, Poe, we're gonna fix, we're gonna try. Finn's been working with a team to develop a deprogramming protocol. For other troopers, but ... we think maybe it could help you, too. You remember Finn, right? The man you escaped with?"

Just a fairy tale, like he was putting a child to bed.

_Did to me? Who, Ben? He took - he took a lot. But I'm still me. Who I've always been._

_You know it, Iolo, please, if anyone was gonna understand, it'd be you, right?_

The pilot's fingers were on his neck, checking his pulse.

“It's gonna be okay, Poe. We love you,” he murmured, smoothing his hair, and Poe didn't pull away.

 

_I know you guys think you're doing the right thing. But I can't. It's too late. He's gone. But this is me, too, and it was always gonna be this way, can't you see? I know where I belong, and it's not with you. It was, and it was good, but it's not anymore._

Iolo's hand in his hair felt nice. It wasn't his fault. He didn't know any better. Poe tried to lift his eyelids to look at him.

 

_I don't hate you. I'm sorry I said that. I don't hate you._

    _I know why you're doing this._

    _I love you too._

It felt like it was important to say. But his mouth wouldn't form the words, wouldn't respond; none of his muscles worked, now. He tried to make a kiss, as shorthand for _I love you;_  it just came out as a little _p-_ sound. He tried again, and again, and that was going to have to be good enough, because he was going under fast, crashing, gone.

 

Iolo stayed, stroking Poe's hair the way he'd always liked, watching the tension drop out of his shoulders, watching his face soften. When he inhaled, his lips touched and parted with a little pop: _p- ... p- ... p- ..._

When he was fully out, Iolo released his arms from behind his back and retied them less suggestively in front. Took his pulse again, whispered _We love you_ one last time, kissed Poe on the forehead, and rose to take off, away from this place and back into the arms of the Resistance.

 

 ...

 

 

* * *

 

...

 

He was aware, for a little while, of being comfortable. Nothing hurt. He felt a peace he hadn't felt in years, like the peace he'd found in the jungle as a child, the ferns swaddling him and the bird chorus lifting to the sky, where the sun was high and small and bright.

 

He saw the sunlight splotchy through his eyelids. Felt friendly hands at his wrists, and on his arms and shoulders, guiding him to safety.

 

He felt safe, and happy, and loved, and he followed where they led.

 

 

...

 

 

* * *

 

 

...

 

 

The third time Iolo got up to check on Poe, he couldn't find a pulse. He ripped out all the slipknots, letting Poe's limbs fall loose. He pinched a pressure point, harder, nothing. Ground his knuckles into Poe's sternum, still nothing.

He slapped his friend's face, and that was a terrible mistake from which his heart would never recover. In a split second, fourteen months' worth of memories from over a decade ago lit up in his brain, of Poe's hot, flushed cheeks, turning back, defiant, again and again, of sharp breath sucked through pleading lips, of eyelashes fluttering across dilated pupils, of arching beneath him, begging for more, more, more... but Poe's body was limp, and his head was dead weight, flopping to the side and staying there. 

He reached reflexively to his chest, for his crash kit, but it wasn't there. If he'd been in uniform, he'd have had two adrenaline autojectors at his fingertips. He raced to the hatch and pulled the med kit off the wall and found: no adrenaline.

How was that possible? Had it not been restocked at some point? He blew into his friend's lungs and climbed onto him to begin CPR.

And then he remembered: exo kits. They must have exo kits on this thing. He ransacked the compartments until he found them, shrinkwrapped. He ripped one open, unfurled the suit and tore open the crash box, and there, thank the Force, were two autojectors.

He ripped Poe's shirt open and pressed the first dose into his neck, and began CPR.

When there was no pulse after five minutes, he gave the second dose. He kept pumping at Poe's chest until he collapsed. His tears coated his friend's chest and neck, dripping down and soaking the low collar of his pretty lavendar silk shirt.

 

* * *

 

There was an after-action review. There were lessons learned. Mainly that there should have been a med-droid, or a copilot, or both. But they had neither to spare, they were stretched so thin. If they'd waited until they had enough resources, that time might never have come. Or it might have come too late: The autopsy showed the subject had survived at least one heart attack and multiple concussions, in addition to liver scarring and all kinds of inflammations. And: bizarre brain lesions, inconsistent with any diseases in the literature.

If it was any consolation to Cpt Arana, the autopsy also showed minimal cortisol in the subject's muscle tissue, despite elevated levels of hydrocortisol metabolites in the liver. When asked what the fuck that was supposed to mean, the doctor assured him that Cdr Dameron hadn't died in any pain, at least.

It was no consolation.

Not with _Y_ _ou bastard, I fucking hate you_ ringing in his ears.

...

 

He knew how it looked. Like he was following Poe into the bottle. Like he was taking narcs every night because he was trying to kill himself with the same combination of poisons he'd killed his friend with. His closest friends knew his mind didn't work that way. Poe would have known that. He was just taking what worked. He just wanted the pain to go away.

It wasn't long before he was grounded. That was fine with him, he was leaving anyway. There was a limit to how many pills he could obtain on base, and it wasn't near enough. They pleaded with him to stay, to stay in therapy, to get clean. Things would get better. It sounded a lot like what he'd tried to say to Poe.

He left. He slept his life away for a few months, until the pills just didn't work the way they used to. But there was soma. And soma took the pain away. Eventually it took the pain away forever, on a grimy pallet in a dim shooting gallery, when his broken heart stopped beating.

 

* * *

 


End file.
